Anybody still awake out there ? Especially in the UK – although I hope it’s good wherever you are. I have NEVER seen such a beautiful night sky in England as here tonight in Surrey. If you’re anywhere nearby put in some very warm clothes and go to somewhere as far from lights as possible. Then give your eyes 5 mins to adjust – do NOT look at you phone !! – and gasp at the glorious Brave Winter Stars rising in the south east. It’s breathtaking !! And to cap it all I think I’m seeing some aurora in the North. Go ! This is worth losing sleep for !!! Bri.
💥💥💥💥
PS – take your binoculArs with you !!!
Unexpectedly, tonight I was gifted the most beautiful Night Sky I have ever seen down here in Surrey, since we moved here a couple of years ago. I had almost given up hope, because there’s almost always a layer of mist up there, reflecting light from the nearby towns, but tonight, miraculously the sky was transparent and black, and the stars glittered, dazzling like diamonds. The only camera I had to hand was my iPhone 15 Pro Max.
Now iPhones are notoriously difficult to use in low light conditions, and I’ve wasted many hours trying to get iPhones to focus zoomed in on the Moon ! But with a little patience, it’s possible to use the new time exposure function to get pretty damn good pictures of large areas of the night sky. If you turn the flash off, the camera will decide to integrate over five seconds, while you hold the phone as steady as you can. Anybody who has done astrophotography on film will tell you that this would never normally work without a tripod. But the new software on the iPhone is very clever. While it’s integrating all the instantaneous pictures, it’s ingeniously adjusting them into register, so the camera will compensate for the wobble of your hands, and it will deliver an amazingly sharp picture – if you’re lucky ! Without a focus lock on infinity, it will always be hit or miss, but the hits are nice! !
Here we see Orion rising magnificently in the South East, and above him the constellation of Taurus the Bull, with the distinctive V-shaped cluster signifying its head, known as the Hyades. To the left is the brilliant planet Jupiter – dominating this blazing sky even more than this picture can portray. And right at the top of the picture the tiny compact cluster of the Pleiades, famously “like a swarm of fireflies, tangled in a silver braid”, I’m so glad to see, from your comments, that many of you folks also enjoyed this wondrous sight tonight. If not, tomorrow may be clear also !!
cheers all – Bri