These comets are wonderful in a pair of binoculars and if you can go out and have a look. Here is how to find comet Lemmon and PanSTARRS

The image covers 360 degrees horizontally and features the Milky Way, Jupiter, Orion, Magellanic Clouds and Southern Cross. Below is the virtual reality tour which should get you close to “being there”.

Loch Ard Gorge Panorama

If you click on the Virtual Tour thumbnail on the left you should be able to pan and zoom using the buttons at the bottom of the image or just click and drag it with the mouse to pan and use Shift/Ctrl keys to zoom in and out. Adobe Flash player is required.

I waited for the next New Moon in January 2013 and ventured out to Squeaky Beach at night. Electric blue surf started to appear when it became dark and it was amazing to see the blue sparkle as I walked in the water.

The ghostly blue light is is produced by small single-celled marine micro-organisms called Noctiluca scintillans (commonly known as the Sea Sparkle) through a chemical reaction. It can be found all over the globe and particularly in areas of nutrient-rich waters. I could not resist adding Aurora Australis footage I took at Mornington Peninsula in October 2012 to create the natural “Liquid Light Show”.

The “Memories of the Moon” track by zero-project was a perfect fit for this time-lapse.

Images and Virtual Reality Tour

Squeaky Beach Panorama

If you click on the Virtual Tour thumbnail on the left you should be able to pan and zoom using the buttons at the bottom of the image or just click and drag it with the mouse to pan and use Shift/Ctrl keys to zoom in and out. Adobe Flash player is required.

Thanks to Promote DSLR controllers I was able to enjoy the visual show whilst three cameras clicked through the pre-programmed eclipse sequences.

The image above closely resembles what we saw just moments before the beginning of the totality phase – the “diamond ring” effect, where a small portion of the Sun is still showing.

I still have lots of images to go through and below is just a small sample of  images I took during the eclipse.

19960 images, 3 cameras, 5 nights — I hope you enjoy the time-lapse video (please put the sound on):

ASKAP  is a very impressive instrument with 36 antennas, each 12 meters in diameter, spread out over 4,000 square meters and working together as a single instrument. Murchison Radio-astronomy observatory is one of the most radio-quiet places in the World and not many people come by. This footage may be quite unique because after the telescope testing phase is completed, any electronic equipment, including cameras, may not be used near the telescope.

It was an unforgettable experience — I stayed at the telescope during the day, helped scripting and testing the antenna movement for the night with CSIRO scientist Maxim Voronkov and just enjoyed the remote location with no mobile phones.

Alex Cherney

One lucky night the fog descended on the valley but Mt. John remained above it.

The lights of Lake Tekapo village and passing cars under the blanket of fog made for a very cool foreground. I think I like it even better than Aurora. Warm thanks to the University of Canterbury for letting me use the Mt. John Observatory grounds.

Matariki (the Māori name for the Pleiades) eluded me due to clouds or a full memory card until the very last morning at the Church of Good Shepherd. Even then it looked like the fog thickened just before Matariki rose but it cleared up just in time when Jupiter and Venus joined the show.

I hope you enjoy watching this five-minute long film as much as I enjoyed making it.

• I was going to Parkes, NSW to attend Astrofest held by the Central West Astronomical Society and David Malin astrophotography awards
• There was a going to be very nice alignment in the early morning sky with Pleiades,  Moon, Jupiter, Venus and Orion constellation, which I hoped to photograph above the Dish

The awards night was exciting and I was extremely happy to find out that my images won two categories and received three honourable mentions (full report to follow).

After the awards dinner I drove to the Dish and watched the clouds come and go. When it started to rain just before the twilight I thought that all was lost, packed up my cameras and drove back for about 5 minutes. Then I looked out of the car window and saw the clearing in the sky which headed towards were I just was. Not thinking for too long I turned the car back, raced back to the Dish, put the camera on the tripod and managed to take just a few images before the sky closed again.

Annotated image:

Moments like this make all sleepless nights very worthwhile indeed!

This image was selected for NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (July 19, 2012).

The red color of this aurora is caused by  the charged particles from the Sun exciting  oxygen atoms high in the Earth’s atmosphere. Hopefully there will be more to come as Sun’s activity increases in 2012-13.

Being able to photograph it all night I came up with a nice video. The brighter Aurora happened on January 22nd and the smaller one, featured in the middle section, was from January 16th followed by a rather bright Moonrise.

On the morning of December 23rd I was at Cape Schanck, Victoria and the comet rising above the Southern Ocean was as magnificent to see as it appears on these photos.

I also managed to photograph the comet when it was much fainter on December 30th, from Great Ocean Road as seen in this “Little Planet” image stitched from 12 fish-eye photos.

The documentary went on air in Japan on national TV (BS Japan) November 27th and here is the announcement with a short preview in Japanese and Google translation

Lake Tekapo on South Island in New Zealand is arguably one of best night sky locations in the Southern Hemisphere. The sky there is seriously dark and the Lake Tekapo village manages to control light pollution nicely (being next to Mt John observatory). The lights in the village can be seen but there is not much scatter above, even in long exposures. The orange glow is only noticeable when reflected by low clouds directly above.

I fell in love with the place and will definitely come back again, hopefully when Aurora Australis is on display.

Virtual Tour

height=”100″ Tekapo Starlight

You can see the amazing sky at Lake Tekapo in this 360 degree virtual tour (use mouse to navigate inside)

Night Sky and Light Pollution

The significance of Lake Tekapo pristine night sky without light pollution is recognised world-wide and is being included in the list of UNESCO Starlight Reserves. The World at Night works closely with UNESCO Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative helping increase public awareness of the importance of dark skies.

More images