A good atlas is essential for travel. This excellent atlas will take the voyager on a journey through the night sky with unparalleled ease and accuracy. The long-awaited second edition of Wil Tirion's superb Sky Atlas 2000.0 offers 43,000 additional stars with all positions now derived from the Hipparcos database. The atlas opens out to reveal 26 charts, each one 20 inches wide and 15 inches deep. This large format allows the stars, nebulas and galaxies to be displayed with unrivaled clarity. For this edition, improved isophotal (objects with same light intensity) maps are used for the Milky Way, and extra charts for crowded areas of the sky have been added. Within the constellations, Flamsteed numbers identify the brighter stars by name, while NGC and Messier numbers are used for nonstellar objects. Color coding and size graduation are used to visually convey the maximum information on star types and brightnesses. This atlas is an indispensable aid for all users of astronomical telescopes.
