Celestial Happenings for Photographers and Star Gazers in 2012

Every year, the heavens provide us with heaps of opportunities to view and even photograph unique celestial events. If you live in an area or can easily travel to an area where there is little or no ambient light from nearby cities, these star shows will offer spectacular sights this year.

For those unfamiliar with photographing celestial events, there's both an art and a science to capturing these events but there's also a need for some luck since weather plays an important role in how well celestial events can be viewed. I can remember several times I've planned out shoots at a specific location where a meteor shower or an eclipse would take place only to be skunked by cloud cover. It's a challenging endeavor for sure.

To start out, here's a list of Full Moons and New Moons for 2012. New Moon is when the un-illuminated portion of the Moon faces almost directly toward Earth, so that the Moon is not visible to the naked eye. This is best for shooting star trails and meteor showers since ambient light in the sky is reduced.

Full Moons	New Moons
January 9 February 7 March 8 April 6 May 6 June 4 July 3 August 2 and 31                                      September 30 October 29 November 28 December 28	January 23 February 21 March 22 April 21 May 21 June 19 July 19 August 17 September 16 October 15 November 13 December 13

For details on photographing the moon, check out our article titled, "How to Photograph the Moon".

While the aim of this article was not to provide a complete list of celestial events, it does aim to provide a list of the most notable events of 2012. Here are a few that will definitely be worth watching:



1) January 4 - Quadrantid Meteor Shower. This shower is a short one so don't expect residual for a day or two on either side. The trick with this meteor shower is to catch it at its peak. This shower reaches its peak in the predawn hours of Jan. 4 for eastern North America. From the eastern half of North America, a single observer might count on seeing as many as 50 to 100 meteors in a single hour. For more info on this shower, visit www.SpaceWeather.com

2) May 6: Biggest Full Moon of 2012 - On this day, the Moon will only be separated from the Earth by only 221,801 miles...but who's counting?

3) May 21: Annular Eclipse of the Sun - The path of this eclipse starts over eastern China and sweeps northeast across southern and central Japan. The path continues northeast then east, passing just south of Alaska's Aleutian Island chain. The path then turns to the southeast, making landfall in the western United States along the California-Oregon coast. It will pass over central Nevada, southern Utah, northern Arizona, the extreme southwest corner of Colorado and most of New Mexico before coming to an end over northern Texas.

Locations that will witness this sight include Eureka and Reading, California, Carson City, Reno and Ely, Nevada, Bryce Canyon in Utah, The Grand Canyon, Albuquerque and Santa Fe in N.M., and just prior to sunset for Lubbock, Texas. A partial eclipse of the sun will be visible over a large swath of the United States and Canada, including Alaska and Hawaii, but no eclipse will be visible near and along the Atlantic Seaboard.

4) Aug. 12: Perseid Meteor Shower - This one is always good! The Perseids are considered to be among the best of the annual displays thanks to its high rates of up to 90 per hour as well as great reliability.



5) Nov. 13: Total Eclipse of the Sun - The first total solar eclipse since July 2010. Virtually the entire path of totality falls over water. At the very beginning, the track cuts through Australia's Northern Territory just to the east of Darwin, then across the Gulf of Carpentaria, then through northern Queensland, passing over Cairns and Port Douglas before heading out to sea. The rest of the eclipse path, including the point of the maximum duration of totality is over the the Pacific Ocean.

6) Dec. 13-14: Geminid Meteor Shower - If there is one meteor display guaranteed to be worth the effort, it's this one. You can start observing as soon as darkness falls on the evening of Dec. 13 as Gemini starts coming up above the eastern horizon and continue through the rest of the night. Around 2 a.m. when Gemini is almost directly overhead, you might see as many as two meteor sightings per minute...120 per hour!

Photographer's Ephemeris - is a software tool that can be used on your Android phone or on your PC that will help you plan your shoot relative to the rising and setting of the sun and moon each day for any location worldwide. It also provides the path across the sky that both will follow. I have both versions and I use them regularly so I have no trouble recommending them as I find them to be extremely useful...even essential. You'll want to run the full moon and new moon dates provided above through this tool relative to your area as each hemisphere will experience these events at slightly different times. The PC version (when I last checked) is free while the Android version costs a few dollars.

For your Android Phone

For your PC