It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope.
features
sky
- default catalogue of over 600,000 stars
- extra catalogues with more than 177 million stars
- default catalogue of over 80,000 deep-sky objects
- extra catalogue with more than 1 million deep-sky objects
- asterisms and illustrations of the constellations
- constellations for 20+ different cultures
- images of nebulae (full Messier catalogue)
- realistic Milky Way
- very realistic atmosphere, sunrise and sunset
- the planets and their satellites
interface
- a powerful zoom
- time control
- multilingual interface
- fisheye projection for planetarium domes
- spheric mirror projection for your own low-cost dome
- all new graphical interface and extensive keyboard control
- telescope control
visualisation
- equatorial and azimuthal grids
- star twinkling
- shooting stars
- tails of comets
- iridium flares simulation
- eclipse simulation
- supernovae and novae simulation
- 3D sceneries
- skinnable landscapes with spheric panorama projection
customizability
- plugin system adding artifical satellites, ocular simulation, telescope control and more
- ability to add new solar system objects from online resources...
- add your own deep sky objects, landscapes, constellation images, scripts...