Hi Niv,
regarding your question on star hopping....
My suggestion would be to learn the 26 brightest stars in the night sky. Don't be overwhelmed, you'll get to know them fairly quickly.
http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/con...brightest.html
I think it's a lot easier to start with this than trying to learn complete constellations quickly. I think you'll learn more by taking it slow and just concentrating on a couple of constellations at a time (as I do). You'll also get familiar with the brighter stars within that constellation by name. The alpha stars are usually (but not always!) the brightest members. I enjoy the times when I stay within a constellation and explore it really well, this way I not only get familiar where objects are, they're put to memory easier, and it also makes it more personable for me. It's a great feeling- I really feel at one with the sky when I can look at a whole constellation and "know" what lays where
. Usually!
You'll get there soon enough.
Star hopping is using the brightest stars in the constellation and then generally zeroing in on the fainter stars thru the finder to make a trail to the object. Make out patterns from them- arrow shape, square etc to figure out the trail. A very good example of a star hop would be the one to M104 (The Sombrero Galaxy) in Corvus, which is in our skies now.
Take a look at it here on
this thread and refer to post no#36 by pgc hunter and post no#37 by Eric. Print it/bookmark it- it's a fantastic hop!
What's also helpful is learning how to measure the sky using your hand.
See
here. Close one eye and use your outstretched hand. As an example, with M104, you would measure the 4 degrees by hand from the launchpad of delta Corvus to know whereabouts that galaxy sits- so you know how much sky you're dealing with.