Tutorials

These tutorials and guides offer helpful step by step advice on equipment and observational techniques. You can search by topic and difficulty level, from starting out to advanced. For those new to astronomy and observation, we recommend our starting out page as a guide to this section.

Visual observation of Jupiter
2023 Jul 28 - Intermediate
John Rogers (BAA Jupiter Section Director)

Estimating the Coma Size and Brightness of Comets (Part 2: Imaging)
2023 Apr 9 - Intermediate
Nick James and David Swan

Capturing Cosmic Rays with a Digital Camera
2023 Feb 26 - Intermediate
Rudy E. Kokich

Figure 1. Abell 2163, a distant cluster of galaxies, all receding from us. (Source Wikimedia Commons, originator NASA/ESA/Hubble)
The Expanding Universe: Doppler Shift To Dark Energy
2022 May 10 - Starting Out
David Basey

A source of light waves moving to the right, relative to observers, with velocity 0.7c. The frequency is higher for observers on the right, and lower for observers on the left.
The Doppler Effect in Astronomy
2022 Apr 18 - Starting Out
David Basey

Tutorial: Recording your observations
2022 Feb 6 - Starting Out
David Swan

Newtonian Telescopes
Newtonians are cool
2022 Jan 13 - Intermediate
Daryl Dobbs

Figure 1
Dark adapting an iPhone/iPad
2021 Dec 20 - Starting Out
Daryl Dobbs

Mercury – the iron planet
2021 May 29 - Starting Out
Chris Hooker

Psychrometric chart
Dealing with dew
2021 May 15 - Starting Out
David Arditti

Venus as a planet
2021 Mar 6 - Starting Out
David Basey

Sky-Watcher reticle
Using a polarscope
2021 Feb 6 - Starting Out
David Arditti

Fig 1
Wide-field astrophotography
2021 Jan 14 - Starting Out
Tony Morris

LS 2
Our Star – The Sun
2020 Nov 12 - Starting Out
Lyn Smith

Starting out
2020 Nov 12 - Starting Out
David Basey

Equatorial
Through which end do I look?
2020 Nov 12 - Starting Out
David Arditti

Understanding image defects
2020 Nov 7 - Starting Out
David Arditti

Exoplanet Transit Imaging and Analysis
2020 Jul 7 - Advanced
Mark Salisbury