Southern Stars has announced a promotion of its new SkySafari 3 iOS astronomy app, timed to coincide with tonight’s total lunar eclipse. Although not visible from North America, the June 15/16th lunar eclipse will be seen almost everywhere else – over Europe, South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia. It is the longest total lunar eclipse since 2000. To celebrate the eclipse and SkySafari’s second birthday, the basic version of SkySafari 3 will be free until June 18th. The timing couldn’t be better.
In addition to the basic version, SkySafari 3 comes in Plus ($15) and Pro ($60) versions. And until June 21, those versions are half-price as well. SkySafari’s creators designed the application to be accurate. According to Southern Stars, it was the only iOS astronomy app that correctly reproduced the total lunar eclipse that occurred last December. The Plus and Pro versions add telescope control with SkyWire (http://www.southernstars.com/products/skywire/index.html), an RS-232 cable that connects an iDevice to a telescope. The Pro version has the largest database of any astronomy app yet. Weighing in at 500 MB, it includes 15 million stars from the Hubble Guide Star catalog; 740,000 galaxies to 18th magnitude; and 550,000 solar system objects – including every comet and asteroid known to science.
Whether or not you can see tomorrow night’s eclipse, the application is available free on the iTunes store until June 18th.
To download SkySafari 3 now, go to the iTunes store by clicking this link:
(http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/skysafari-3/id437108143?mt=8)
To download SkySafari 3 Pro now, go to the iTunes store by clicking this link:
(http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/skysafari-3-pro/id437112382?mt=8)