What we got now… well this time an HTML5 / javascript based sky viewer, nakshArt - The art of celestial stars!!
nakshArt is a step to bring sky viewing experience through modern web browsers, with the advantage being faster in rendering sky view. nakshArt is an astronomical sky viewer application that draws stars, constellation, celestial objects on the fly using canvas, based on the current location of your browser.
Technically it uses HTML5 features like canvas, local storage, geo location and much more. The rendering of sky view is as fast as plugin based application.
nashkArt is a work in progress application, many more features are waiting to be added.
Meanwhile try your hands on nakshArt @naskhart.com. Works better on latest chrome, firefox, safari.
Update: v0.5b is out, with a better look and feel. Try now!
Features (v0.5b)
- Select a location and view that sky
- Double Click Zoom In/Zoom Out
- Drag Sky View (on the fly generation and no caching!), etc
- Extra celestial Object information added (like galaxy, nebulae, etc)
- Constellation labels are added.
- Navigation directions added (though buggy when on Poles).
- Take Snapshot of Sky!
- Cool menus!
Road Map
- Use of worker threads!
- Save the sky!
- Rich View of constellation, stars, celestial objects
- Open source it.
28 Comments
This feature seems not to be working: “Select a location and view that sky”
I’m using v0.3b in Chrome.
Thanks for pointing it out. It was due to a change in google map apis. The feature is working now.
i have just downloaded ver0.4b and nothing. Menu on left and big black circle in the middle of screen with n, s, e, and west. thats all
If you are seeing a blank, then your browser doesn’t support canvas element. Try latest browsers from Chrome, Safari, Firefox (HTML5 support)
Your sky viewer is awesome. Thank you.
Could we help in making a taylored version of your hmtl5 Art of Stars for our astronomy club’s webpage?
Many Thanks
Diego Rodríguez
Secretary, Cosmos Grup d’Astronomia de Mataró
Nice job so far. Great to see the constellations, but you should be able to click in an area to have the constellation names appear or disappear. Having them all on screen at once is too confusing.
Excellent. Is it possible to zoom in and pan down to view the horizon? I can zoom by double clicking, but the horizon moves out of the browser window, and I couldn’t find a way to move just one edge of the horizon back into the window.
i am using google chrome last version and cannot see anything else than a black circle
Thanks. The whole view doesn’t work around the concept of horizon, as the location isn’t fixed here. Probably we can provide a horizon view given a location. Give us time!
I like the chart but I don’t understand what I am looking at and why is the East on the left side.
That’s a good point. BTW you are not seeing the cardinal direction on earth but on the opposite side which is sky. Remember we need to look up the sky (like lying on the ground, facing the sky and pointing your head to the north, feet to the south, left hand facing east, right hand facing west). The same is reversed when you look a point on the earth (like laying on the ground facing vertically down).
Terrific. Great Job!
Is there a way this could be called as a service. I run a free astrology site – jotiz.com (mobile and ipad).
It would be wonderful to view the charts alongside the actual sky map. I find it very easy explaining (example) current Saturn position at the Virgo / Libra cusp. How it enters Libra fully in 2013. I can do it with the charts – but this is so much more visually appealing.
Just a black circle w/cardinals. Menu at the bottom.
I am using Chrome latest version.
Do I need some kind of plug in or something else?
Cool app. Featured in an article here: http://www.webfiveoh.com/content/posts/2012/jan/mon-16th/html5-3d-sky-map.html
hello,
The design is very good. But what kind of languauges you used for designing this.
Best regards, Sankar
Hello! great extension. I can’t get my orientation though. how does it work with the east on the left side?
this is really cool it makes me feel like im the the galaxy
Good job
Very nice stuff. Would like to stay in touch.
in.linkedin.com/in/navalsaini
Please discard the above post. Dont want to put email id in public as such.
I’m unable to download this! it shows “Checking” all the while? what can i do?
Whats the browser you are using?
This is great! Ursa Major is over my head and I never even knew. Brilliant App. Well done.
Hi, I see on the chart of the sky, it shows the Sun, there, however its the middle of the night here now… why is it showing the opposite side of Earth?
Very kool. Was amazed.
this app only worked once or twice. Now it oly shows a black circle. doesnt matter if i use chrome or ie.
nakshart.com is cool!
Although it does not work correctly with mobile based browsers, esp Android.
Is it the site or the android browser that is the problem here?
Is the site implemented correctly for mobile browser and would you recommend it for android browser testing? or it is in the experimental phase?
is there a way to zoom in and out?