Map of the Heavens

I have been using Starry Night for quite some time now. Almost three years if I am not mistaken. The package is very nice indeed, but a bit heavy for my old Celeron. I finally got tired of waiting an eternity for the screen to scroll.
Then I remebered a nifty package called Cartes du Ciel (CDC). CDC works on Linux and Windows. The core installer for the Windows version is around 9 MB. In addition you can download most of the standard catalogues. I'd recommend both the Hiparchos and the Tycho. If you are going to use it alongwith a telescope, I would also suggest a few of the deep sky ones. You might have to tweak the colour setting to your personal preferrences. I find the default to be very irritating.
Also if you are planning to install it on your laptop and take it outdoors there is a night vision mode is available.
One thing I find very nice is the ability to mark out telescope fields on the sky charts which makes it very easy to star hop to Messier Objects.
Enjoy your cloudless skies.

Here are some links:
Wiki Page : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartes_du_Ciel
Home Page : http://www.stargazing.net/astropc/

Some Screenshots :

Telescope View

Night Vision Mode

Fractly Speaking

After using Photoshop for over three years I finally got tired of doing the same things to get a random fractal-like background. Credit for some of the frustration goes to DeviantArt.com
Seeing some of the work there I was crushed to note that my pseudo-complex designs just didn't match up.
Nonetheless with 2GB of RAM and a 2.2GHz dual core beckoning it was time to call in the big guns. Thats where I came across Apophysis. It generates amazing fractals in real-time on the basis of the transformation you select. Yes I know the description is a bit vague, but given that even I am a noob as far as this software is concerned I hope most of you guys will tolerate it.
Any way I strongly suggest downloading one of the newer (post 2.05) beta versions as most of the tutorials I found work with these.
Also to get an idea of what you can do with Apophysis I have uploaded 3 of my latest creations.

Enjoy :)

The Bedouin

The Lady in the Water(This was touched up in PS later)

Dancing Twins

A Song from Beyond

A few days back while I was reading up for my Maths quiz (MA108 for those interested) I remembered a song a friend had once referred me. Its called Simple Finite Group(of Order Two) by group called Klein4. I know April Fool's is already a week old and this is no joke. In fact I personally recommend you watch it. :)

Here's the link:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTby_e4-Rhg

If you want the lyrics. Here they are:
http://www.stanford.edu/~lekanw/random/music/simplefinite.html

No, its not a cruel joke. Personally I did find it quite funny.
Happy listening. ;)

Return of the King

This blog was always damned from the start.
If you saw the time between this post and the last you would have certainly realized that by now. So one may remark what's the cause for this rousing of the Shire. The answer is simply a trip down Bagshot row or memory lane for the not so Tolkienshly inclined. It so happened that I decided that today was the day of judgment. At least for the 3069 odd unfiled emails in my mail box. So as I sat about meticulously labeling and filtering them I saw number 1543. My registration email at blogger more than a year ago. So I decided that the resolution of the month would be to try and keep this blog updated. [Experience tells me that months are better than years when it comes to resolutions ;)]
It is obvious that there is no chance what-so-ever that I may be able to recount all that happened over the past one year. But here goes my attempt:
1. I am now in IIT Bombay.
2. I try to do some tech and lit here.
3. Still love quizzing, astronomy and procrastination.
4. I am more forgetful than ever.
5. Have gotten lazier thanks to Microsoft Office 2007 which will type out these irritating list numbers for me.
6. Have maintained the same old email id for which that half of the world which knows me also hates me.
So for anybody with enough patience and fortitude; I welcome you this blog, for the king has returned

Maiden Post

This post is made with the hope that those which come after it will be better than this one.