The problem with looking at stars is that all you see are little tiny points of light. If you look at them through a large telescope of good quality, you still only see little tiny points of light. However, if you take a long exposure (15 minutes to an hour, depending on film, etc.) photograph of stars, you get slightly larger fuzzy points of light (assuming you have the proper tracking equipment--otherwise you get streaks instead of dots). That's the problem. If infinitesmal points of light were all you could see, the whole thing would get old pretty fast.

Fortunately, that's not all that's up there. Besides the moon and planets, there are illuminated gas clouds, both large and small, and the stars themselves can be quite enthralling when viewed in large groups (galaxies and clusters). Anyway, that's what all this stuff is. The pictures below are thumbnails. Clicking on them will retrieve the full size image.

The orange cloud is the Flame Nebula.
The dark notch in the red cloud toward the bottom
is the horsehead nebula.


The Crab Nebula. This is the wreck of an exploded
star. The explosion was observed in 1054, when a new star
appeared in Taurus. The Chinese reported being able to see it in the
daytime for 23 straight days. It is now impossible to see without
a telescope.



The Great Nebula in Orion.
The gas cloud is some 26 light years
across. Stars are being born here.



The Orion Nebula at higher Magnification.



The great spiral galaxy in andromeda.
Billions and Billions of stars.



The Moon.