Looking Out

[CapturingTheNight]

Hi all,

Hope I am not breaking any rules here, but...............

Ever wish that you could lookout like this on a clear night and see the sky packed full of stars?

Less than a third of the worldwide population and 1% of the continental USA population lives under truly, unpolluted from light, starry skies. Do you?

I am pleased to announce that I am teaming up with the International Dark Sky Association to help raise awareness of the importance of dark skies. To find out how you can take some simple steps towards reconnecting with the night sky, please visit http://www.darksky.org/ and/or follow them here on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/International-Dark-Sky-Association/142158105400

Just doing my good deed for the day.


"Looking Out"
135414
Aurora Australis and Me, Mount Buffalo National Park, Australia.

Taken during twilight when I first started to visually see the aurora dancing across the sky.

Cheers

Greg

[Larryp]

Lovely photo, Greg!

[Joshua Bunn]

Great Cause Greg :thumbsup:, and a lovely photo.
Josh

[frenchbluehour]

great cause.. beautiful pic!... (those stats are nuts!)..

[trek1701]

Done ! :thumbsup:

Dark Skies Mark

[CapturingTheNight]

Thank you very much Laurie, Joshua, Nicole and Mark :D

[Ian Cooper]

Hi Greg,

I've attached a preliminary report that I will send on to Bob evans in Invercargill. Can you check it over and post any comments here in the mean time.

The times are given in U.T. and Standard Time. I worked them out by determining the southern meridian at the time of your photos.

Cheers

Ian

[pw]

What an awesome sight, I wish I'd seen the aurora. Excellent photo.

[CapturingTheNight]

Thank you very much Peter.



All looks good to me Ian. Thanks for that. I'm not really up on the terminology of what I was seeing with my own eyes. You mentioned 'rays' in your report. I saw what I think are two different things on the night. Earlier on (and in this image) there were what looks like closely spaced vertical stripes in the sky, but they were moving very fast across the sky and they didn't appear to be extending to the horizon. They are the whitish streaks you can see in this image. Later on once it got darker I could see large, what I would call rays extending up from the horizon and not moving much during the exposures.

Cheers

Greg

[Ian Cooper]

HI Greg,

what you are describing, i.e. the white bars in mid air moving quite fast, are a rare phenomena from our geo mag lat. This is a very dynamic display in the top 5% of what I have seen over the years. Like you the first time that I saw it I didn't know what I was looking at. That was 31 years ago! That is a very important piece of the observation by you.

They are rays BTW it is just that they are closer to you than the ones that seem to start near the horizon that you saw later on. Its that 2D - 3D thing. Your mind has to learn how to separate the multiple layers that you are seeing/imaging. It all takes practice, but I think you are learning quickly. It was only when I started photorgaphing the aurorae during cycle 22 that I really understood what was going on.

Many thanks once again.

BTW that's an intersting looking spot rotating onto the solar disc right now. It could be worth keeping an eye on.

[CapturingTheNight]

Very cool to know. Thank you so much for that again Ian. Yeah hopefully that large sun spot fires out some nice Earth diected activity. Fingers crossed!
Cheers