What would the night sky look like from another planet?

[Anise]

@Reply

That’d be a really neat scene. I’ve never seen the stars from underwater, much less through water and ice and a thin atmosphere with water vapor and ice crystals. I wonder how they’ll sparkle.

I don’t know, but I’m getting some great ideas here. Thanks to everybody!

[Lazlo]

@Anise

Oh, this fandom doesn’t expect any SF content at ALL. It’s just a bit in the ending, when the two characters had to enter the wheel of birth and rebirth and ended up being reincarnated on Enceladus together five hundred years later, having finally made up for their sins. Anyway, what great pics!!

You should put a spoiler tag around something like that!

[Reply]

So, Anise, did you end up writing Europa Report?

A bunch of people go to one of Jupiter’s moons and find thermal activity and warm oceans. They send a sub beneath the ocean, look through its magic camera, and eventually they find… a giant octopus. There’s even a scene where they gaze at the night sky in the fashion you describe. And then they all “enter the cycle of rebirth”, as you say.

Someone stole your script!

[Anise]

Well, you never know who’s spying on you
(looks around shiftily)

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, NSA. MOVE ALONG.

Thanks for the link!

[ZenBeam]

@Reply

In that picture? I have no idea Here’s another shot with Earth targeted in the lower left:
http://oi41.tinypic.com/1e2k51.jpg

That bright star next to Earth is our Sun.

Is the small spot just to the left of the Earth the Moon?

[Chronos]

Probably. The Moon should be visible, at about that brightness, and it looks like it’s at least roughly in the right plane. It’s still possible that the actual Moon is hidden and that’s just a coincidental background star, of course.

[Reply]

@ZenBeam

Is the small spot just to the left of the Earth the Moon?

I honestly don’t remember (this is a zombie from last year), but if you download Stellarium and input the same parameters (look at Earth from Enceladus) at the same time, you should be able to click on that dot to figure out what it is.