Spring | Summer | Autumn | Winter

The following images are designed to demonstrate the night sky as seen when looking in the appropriate direction during a given season. By moving the mouse over the image, constellation drawings will appear. Sometimes it can be difficult to trace out a constellation without seeing an example because of several factors to include: light pollution, changes in position due to season changes, size differences from star charts to real size, and unfamiliarity. Hopefully this guide will help change this.

Please be patient as the design of this page downloads the images so the mouse-over and larger images will appear faster when accessing each image.

These images constitute the northern hemisphere as seen from San Francisco, California. Click on the image to view a larger size. You may notice right away the band of stars in some of these images. This is our Milky Way galaxy, and such a dramatic view is not possible in real life; however, if observing far away from city lights this band is visible - the darker the location, the more dramatic the band.

All images are from Starry Night, version 4.5.