Milky Way over Galapagos Astrophotography

We can allow satellites, planets, suns, 

universe, nay whole systems of universes, 

to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, 

we wish to be created at once by special act.

--Charles Darwin

Panorama of Milky Way - 40 photos (it takes about 1 hour). On this photo you can see Orion, Crux (Southern Cross), Canis Major, Carinae, Centaurus Constellations, and three brightest stars of the Earth sky: Sirius, Canopus and Rigel Kentaurus. The night sky airglow (red and green sheen) is visible on this panorama too.

Milky Way over Galapagos Astrophotography

 Canon EOS 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 16.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400, Puerto Villamil, Isabela Island, Galapagos, Ecuador.

One more photo: "How to Train Your Dragon"

The marine iguana (Amblyrhynchus cristatus), also known as the sea iguana, saltwater iguana, or Galapagos marine iguana, is a species of iguana found only on the Galápagos Islands (Ecuador) that has the ability, unique among modern lizards, to forage in the sea, making it a marine reptile.

How to Train Your Dragon or Milky Way over Galapagos Astrophotography

Not so much were changes on Galapagos Islands during last 3 millions years!

The blue-footed booby (Sula nebouxii) is a marine bird. The blue-footed booby is distributed among the continental coasts of the eastern Pacific Ocean from California to the Galapagos Islands down into Peru. The blue color of the blue-footed booby's webbed feet comes from carotenoid pigments obtained from its diet of fresh fish.

The blue-footed booby and Milky Way Isabela Island Galapagos Ecuador

Frigatebirds (also listed as "frigate bird", "frigate-bird", "frigate", "frigate-petrel") are a family of seabirds called Fregatidae which are found across all tropical and subtropical oceans. Females have white underbellies and males have a distinctive red gular pouch, which they inflate during the breeding season to attract females.

Frigate-bird and Milky Way - Galapagos Islands

Darwin's finches (also known as the Galapagos finches) are a group of about 15 species of passerine birds. During the survey voyage of HMS Beagle, Darwin was unaware of the significance of the birds of the Galapagos. These birds were to play an important part in the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection.

Darwin's Galapagos finch and night cloudy sky Santa Cruz Island

Most of Galapagos Flamingo plumage is pink, giving rise to its earlier name of Rosy Flamingo and differentiating adults from the much paler European species. Flamingos can only eat with their head upside down. Their beaks have lamellae (thin, flat membranes) which are used to filter the mud.

Galapagos Flamingo and Milky Way Astrophotography

The Galapagos tortoise are the largest living species of tortoise. Modern Galapagos tortoises can weigh up to 417 kg (919 lb). Today, giant tortoises exist on only two remote archipelagos: the Galapagos Islands 1000 km due west of mainland Ecuador; and Aldabrachelys gigantea of Aldabra in the Indian Ocean, 700 km east of Tanzania.

Galapagos giant tortoise and Orion - night sky

Sky Ladder - Galapagos Nightscape Astrophotography

The Night Sky at Galapagos Islands is one of the best dark sky which I saw! The darkness of night sky based on Bortle scale was very close to Level 1 (Excellent dark-sky site): clouds are only visible as dark holes against the sky, airglow is readily visible. I did not see a lot of night photos at Galapagos in internet, but I think it will be a lot soon, it is really one more attraction on the islands.

Sky Ladder - Galapagos Nightscape Astrophotography

Canon EOS 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400. Puerto Villamil, Isabela Island, Galapagos, Ecuador, Nightscape Astrophotography.

Arches National Park Astrophotography

I continue my Astrophotography tourism to compare Night Sky from different places of the word. The constellations are the same but it looks different in other locations. These photos from my trip to Arches National Park. There are about 2,000 arches in the park! And a lot of other amazing landscapes! Even during a day, it looks absolutely unreal. But at night is fantastic and amazing! Looks like you on the other planet! The sky in the Arches is truly dark and during new moon you can easy to see Airglow! And on the photo sky is astonishing colorful with greenish reddish and other spectrum colors. All this creates amazing night landscape photos. Really Arches National Park is one of the top 10 best places for astrophotography and night landscaping photos!

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 20.0 sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400 - panorama of 40 images.

Arching Milky Way - Arches Astrophotography 

Sailing Milky Way. We are traveling together on a little spaceship. We call this ship the Earth. It sailing Milky Way through the space-time. This photo is just illustration of this Spaceship Earth idea. Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400 - panorama 5 images

Sail Milky Way over Park Avenue at Arches National Park Astrophotography

 Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Stairway to Heaven Arches - National Park Astrophotography Night landscape

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Balanced Rock and Milky Way - Arches Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Airglow and Balanced Rock - Arches NP Astrophotography

And finally there are photos of arches.

"Smoking gun" - Turret Arch and Milky Way :) I think on this picture we see evidence of ... Big Bang :) Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400 - Panorama 5 images

Turret Arch and Milky Way - Arches National Park Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400 - Panorama 5 images

North and South Windows Arches and Starry Sky - Arches National Park Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Double Arch and Milky Way - Arches National Park Night Landscape Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400 - panorama of two photos

Rainbow Milky Way over Double Arch Panorama Astrophotography

Balanced Rock Arches National Park Utah Night Landscape Astrophotography

Balanced Rock is one of example of erosion. Absolutely not understandable how it still keeping balance! Even you see it during day it is amazing, but at night it looks fantastic! These photos were done during my trip to Arches National Park.

Balanced Rock, Milky Way and drama of clouds on the sky. Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Balanced Rock and Milky Way Arches National Park Utah Night Landscape Astrophotography

Airglow and Balanced Rock.The natural moonless night sky is dark but not black; it is not even blue (no scattering light from sun and moon). Earth atmosphere generates green, red, orange, yellow light- Airglow! All these doing Arches national park is one of the best place for astroscape photography. Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 25.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Airglow and Balanced Rock - Arches National Park Utah Night Landscape Astrophotography

Green Sky Utah Airglow Astrophotography Canon 60Da

The sky is green, the night is dark - as simple as possible. This photo was done at Bryce Canyon, Utah. Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

Green Sky Utah Airglow Astrophotography Canon 60Da

The natural moonless night sky is dark but not black; it is not even blue (no scattering light from sun and moon). Earth atmosphere  emits green, red, orange, yellow light- Airglow!

About 60% of the natural brightness of the night sky at zenith is made up of Airglow. Maximum brightest usually appears at about 10-15 degrees above the horizon, because of the greater the depth of atmosphere at this angle. Airglow is not always uniform. Gravity waves may create considerable variation of Airglow brightness.

You can see Airglow only in real dark sky, but naked eye could not recognize colors. Photos with long exposure able get the colors of Airglow.

The usually dominant color of airglow is green originated from molecular oxygen at 90 to 100 km high. Orange and reddish hue caused by atomic oxygen in 150-300 km above the ground, Yellow light comes from sodium atoms in a layer at about 90 km.

Utah Astrophotography

The sky calls to us.
If we do not destroy ourselves,
we will one day venture to the stars.
--Carl Sagan

Utah is one of the best places for landscape Astrophotography in USA and maybe one of top 10 in the word. It has true and excellent amazing dark sky.

Utah Astrophotography - Milky Way and Airglow over Road

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/2.8; ISO 6400

Eruption of  Milky Way Utah Landscape Astrophotography

Airglow and Milky Way Utah Landscape Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 23sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

Night Parking Utah Landscape Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 15sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

Natural Color of Night Sky - Airglow and Big Dipper Utah Astrophotography

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 21sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400
 

Night sky observation with the Astronomy Rangers at Bryce Canyon National Park

Martian landscape from Bryce Canyon

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

Milky Road

 Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

Utah Backyard Astrophotography

Airglow Astrophotography - Bryce Canyon National Park - Sunset Point

Night sky with green Airglow, the Milky Way, Seven Sisters and Andromeda Galaxy is on the top; hoodoos, caused by erosion over many millennia are on bottom.  This photo was done from my trip to Bryce Canyon in Sunset Point.

Airglow Astrophotography in Bryce Canyon National Park

Canon 60Da, EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, 30.0 sec; f/3.5; ISO 6400

On this picture you can see a lot of green color on the sky. If this is real color or just effect of camera filter? This question directly connected to other question “What is natural color of night sky?”

I started to learn astronomy many years ago reading the book with black and white pictures. So in these books I didn't see color picture of the natural sky. Most of time I was living in big city with a lot of light pollution, and I am not able to see natural color of sky.

Still remember when first time recognize that some starts has color and after that read article about color of stars cannot be green. After that article I assumed that green color is very rear on the sky. But this is not correct.

Most of Comet Tails has green color. Some Nebular are green too. Northern Light mostly has green colors. But Northern Light visible only near North Pole, comets are rear so still assume that this green colors are exceptions. When I started see Internet picture I saw a lot of strange colors so assuming that these is Photoshop. Especially after reading article how to remove light pollution in Photoshop. And only made some my own pictures I recognized that green color from Airglow effect is gives a lot of green on the natural sky. So a green color is pretty common on the natural sky too.

This photo got about 1.5K likes on National Parks Traveler Facebook

National Parks Traveler Facebook Astrophotography

Milky Way over Yellowstone National Park Old Faithful geyser Night Sky Landscape Astrophotography Canon 60Da

Do you believe that the Milky Way was not created by a geyser?

Night Sky Yellowstone National Park Old Faithful geyser and Milky Way - Nightscape Astrophotography

Old Faithful Geyser located in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. Green colors of sky near horizon also does not result of the geyser, this is sky Airglow.

Milky Way over Yellowstone National Park Old Faithful geyser Night Sky Landscape Astrophotography Canon 60Da

 Canon 60Da, Wide Angle Lens EF16-35mm f/2.8L II USM, Exposure 30 sec; f/2.8; ISO 3200- Yellowstone Night-scape Astrophotograpgy

There are a lot of legends about origin of the Milky Way all over the Word. Every culture spoke about the Milky Way in terms of allegories that have special meaning to each individual culture. Definitely it should be legend about Milky Way from Yellowstone. However Yellowstone was very special land for Native Americans and they don’t trust white people and don’t like that they know about it. So only little Yellowstone myths we know now. Last year my daughter learned about Native American and I asked her to write the “missing” legend about geyser and the Milky Way.  There is the legend.
      
                                         The geyser, crow, corn, and the Milky Way

During fall the Native Americans were harvesting corn. One day a crow came, it wanted back some of the corn it gave to the Native Americans. It kept stealing the corn until the village made noise shakers and scared the crow away. While the crow was flying away holding corn in its beak, a geyser erupted and the corn kernels flew out of the crow’s beak. The crow chased it into the sky. From this day forward the corn kernels became the stars, and the dust has become the Milky Way.

Pretty much it is very close to what you see on picture above.

Interesting, recently, astronomers founded giant geysers in the center of our Galaxy. So such legend about connection the Milky Way and geysers even make sense but only on other level of understanding of the nature.



There is supervolcano night sky video on youtube. A supereruption of Yellowstone volcano will affect all word. Nobody knows when it happens. Geyser eruptions show that the Yellowstone giant volcano is still active, it just sleeping under wide and starry sky.