Celestia Forums

It seems to me that, as far as i've looked, all objects rotate clockwise. Weather it's their axis, or their orbit path, its always in one direction. I haven't verifyed this, but basically what I'm trying to ask is, is it possible for an object to rotate conterclockwise? And if so, how would it be done in Celestia? Maybe a negetive number for rotation period? Or is it not possible yet?

have you cheked the rotation of Venus???

Two ways to generate an anticlockwise rotation - either specify a negative rotation period, or tip the rotation axis by more than 90 degrees. In Celestia, the convention is that all objects rotate clockwise when viewed from above their north pole (ie the top of the applied texture) - so you'll find that Venus, Uranus, Triton, Pluto and some asteroids have Obliquities of more than 90 degrees.

Grant

Isn't prograde (earth-type) rotation counterclockwise, when viewed looking down on the north pole...?

Oops! I guess I wrote it backwards

the above post was me

Actually I was correcting grant's post - I didn't notice you'd done that too!

I blame Mike ...
Grant