Space map [Octopus] [WIP]

[selden]

A "real" spacecraft's display would be highly processed in order to show whatever is important to the viewer. The on-screen sizes of the objects wouldn't necessarily be proportional to their physical sizes, for example. I think some kind of (textual?) scale information is needed to clarify this.

This could be a display showing the planets of a three-star system.

One thing that's missing is the orbital paths. I'd expect the display to include elliptical lines showing how the stars and planets travel around one another.

Moons are missing, too.

The thing that's bothering me the most is the illumination of the planets. If the images are supposed to be magnified real-time views of the planets as seen by the spacecraft, then the planets that are on the far sides of their respective suns would be gibbous (more than half illuminated) while the planets that are on the near sides of their suns would be showing only crescents. Also, the illuminated sides should be pointing toward the stars that they're orbiting, with the centers of the crescents pointed directly toward their sun's center. They shouldn't all be pointing in the same direction.

Here's an example of what I mean, although with only two stars:



(This thumbnail links to a much larger image. The picture was created using Celestia.)

[icosahedron]

A "real" spacecraft's display would be highly processed in order to show whatever is important to the viewer. The on-screen sizes of the objects wouldn't necessarily be proportional to their physical sizes, for example. I think some kind of (textual?) scale information is needed to clarify this.

This could be a display showing the planets of a three-star system.

Good points.