Photographing the night sky in the strange landscape of New Mexico

in #hive-1949133 years ago

In the spring of 2020 I went on a roadtrip to New Mexico. With the pandemic in full swing it was the perfect time to drive to a remote desert and camp away from civilization for a few days. The landscape here looks otherworldly, especially once the sun sets and the stars appear. This is my favorite image from the trip. The bright objects to the left of the hoodoo are the planetary duo of Jupiter and Saturn which were unusually close that night.

Alien Throne.jpg

The previous night I shot this mushroom-shaped hoodoo standing tall while the Milky Way peeks through the clouds. Typically I aim to have clear skies when shooting the night sky, but I think the thin clouds in this image are adding a lot of interest to the scene. They look as if they were captured during sunset, but they are actually lit by light pollution from a nearby town.

Magic mushroom.jpg

These swirling, eroded sandstone boulders evoke a feeling of standing on a planet from another world and being surrounded by alien creatures emerging from their cracked eggs shells. This area was once covered by an ancient sea and as the water receded it left behind a thick layer of jumbled sandstone, mudstone and shale that lay undisturbed for 50 million years. When 6,000 years ago the last ice age receded it carved the landscape into its current eerie shape.

Alien eggs.jpg

I'm excited to be able to say the first image has been nominated for the Astronomy Photographer of the Year award organized by Royal Museums Greenwich. A huge honor to just be on the shortlist and I would appreciate if you click here and vote!

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Thank you!

I wanted to vote for you, but the link leads to a general site and they offer to buy tickets to the exhibition...
What lens did you use and what is the exposure time, if not a secret.
Amazing photos. Everything is visible, but the stars are not blurred ... I'm amazed :)
!invest_vote

Thank you! I used a Tamron 15-30 lens. You can buy tickets, but also for one of the images nominated!

@bambuka denkt du hast ein Vote durch @investinthefutur verdient!
@bambuka thinks you have earned a vote of @investinthefutur !

thanks for the answer. Can you provide a link to your photo? I will gladly vote.

Tamron 15-30 has only f2.8. How did you manage to take a bright shot and still the stars remain stars? Did your camera rotate after them? But then the rest of the landscape would be blurred... What's the trick?
Cheers and !BEER
!invest_vote


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Gorgeous!!
Now I have to go there.

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Incredible shots! I'll definitely go vote for you!

So impressive! I really wonder if you used lightroom and what lenses etc. So fascinating.

Tamron 15-30. Used both Lightroom and Photoshop for editing

Stone mushrooms 😍

Wow. Those are absolutely spectacular! Beautiful extraterrestrial vibes ✨

These are some incredibly fantastic shots. Thanks for sharing.

Wow beautiful shots 🔥 New Mexico looks incredible!

The word "otherworldly" perfectly describes this place!
Nice pictures!

Stunning again! I especially like the third one with that mysterious foreground leading to the milky way. 👏👍

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