AmazingSky

06/20/2026

Here is a view, in versions with and without labels, of the fine evening sky scene over Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta on June 18, with an array of planets with the waxing Moon. It was a superb night at the Park. Even the mosquitoes held off, mostly!

06/17/2026

This is the waxing crescent Moon near Venus in the afternoon, set in the deep blue daytime sky, on June 17, 2026. The Moon had occulted Venus about 3 hours before this but clouds hid that event from view for me. The clouds cleared enough by 4 pm this day to afford some quick shots with a telephoto lens and camera on a tripod. The phase of Venus is just perceptible at the pixel-peeping level as a gibbous phase.

This was from home in southern Alberta. This shows the scene as it appeared in binoculars; I could not see Venus with the unaided eye near the Moon.

Technical:
A stack of 6 x 1/640th second exposures at f/8 with the Canon RF100-400mm lens at 400mm and on the Canon R5 at ISO 200 and set to APS-C crop frame mode to zoom in a bit more.

06/17/2026

This is the summer Milky in Scorpius and Sagittarius low above my rural backyard horizon to the south, on a clear but bright summer night a week before summer solstice. So the sky is not astronomically dark and is a deep blue from perpetual twlight that lasts all night. This was from southern Alberta at latitude 51º North.

But to the south the sky is darkest and still reveals the rich star clouds and red nebulas around the galactic centre. Green bands of airglow also tint the sky, making for a colourful sky to the camera, with blues, greens and reds in the sky.

I used some special filters to bring out the red nebulas, particularly in Scorpius low on the horizon at right, and the large nebula in Ophiuchus (catalogued as Sharpless 2-27) at upper right. The brightest red nebulas at left in the Milky Way are well-known objects from the Messier Catalogue: M8, M16 and M17. It was a very clear night as even some of the lesser-known NGC nebulas in the tail of Scorpius just skimming the horizon show up. These nebulas only show up to the camera and to this extent only with the use of special nebula-isolating filters.

I shot the scene primarly as part of testing the filters. But the image stands on its own as an attractive and colourful scene, and one that records the June near-solstice sky, with red nebulas set in a blue sky tinted by bands of green.

Technical:
This is a complex blend of several exposures taken in quick succession—
- A single long 4-minute exposure for the ground, with no filter and wirh no tracking to keep the ground sharp (at ISO 800)
- A single 1.5-minute tracked exposure for the sky with the Maven Night filter, a broadband light pollution suppression filter (at ISO 1600)
- A single 2-minute tracked exposure for the nebulas with the Maven 20nm Hydrogen-Alpha narrowband filter (at ISO 3200)
- plus another 4-minute tracked exposure for more nebulosity with the Astronomik 12nm H-Alpha clip-in narrowband filter (at ISO 3200)
- Stars were removed from the H-a layers using RC-Astro StarXTerminator AI filter
- plus a 1-minute tracked exposure for the star glows layered in taken with the Maven StarWalker diffusion filter (at ISO 800)

All with the red-sensitive astro-modified Canon Ra camera and Canon RF 15-35mm lens at 24mm and f/2.8 on the MSM Nomad tracker.

All blended in Photoshop. H-a images processed as monochrome images and blended in with BlendIf (with the only the red channel on) and with masking.

06/15/2026

Following up on my still image of the accumulated Starlink satellite trails, here is the time-lapse movie of all 1200 frames taken over 2.5 hours on June 13-14, 2026. The still image I posted previously stacked just one quarter of those frames. Details are in the video description on YouTube.

Do share! If you care!

This 1-minute time-lapse records the tracks of the large number of ...

06/15/2026

This is the satellite strewn sky we now have above us.

The image is an accumulation of exposures showing the number of satellites passing across the summer Milky Way during just 35 minutes on a summer night.

This was from 12:28 am to 1:03 am on June 14, 2026. The field of view here is 54º by 37º.

The field frames the three stars of the Summer Triangle: Deneb at left, Vega at top, and Altair at lower right, in Cygnus, Lyra and Aquila respectively.

This was shot from my location in southern Alberta at 51º North latitude. That latitude range is the worst (!) for seeing satellites in abundance as:
a) in summer around the solstice even satellites in low Earth orbit are lit by sunlight all night long, and
b) many sets of Starlink satellites peak at the most northerly point in their inclined orbits at about my latitude.

And yes, most of the satellite trails are from SpaceX Starlink satellites as most of the satellites now in orbit are Starlinks. And most seen here are following similar parallel paths as Starlinks sets do.

The fast lens and long exposures I used here do make satellites visible that were too faint to see with the unaided eye, just as fainter stars than your eye can see are recorded. Nevertheless, this shows just how many satellites are now passing through any field of view, be it naked eye, camera lens, or telescope.

For this I stacked just 300 frames out of 1200 I shot this night over 2h30m. Stacking more frames only produced a dense, chaotic mess, with so many satellite trails the stars were hidden behind a wall of bright streaks.

Technical:
This is a stack of 300 frames, stacked using the program StarStax using the Lighten blend mode, to add the satellite trails rather than average them out. Each exposure was 6 seconds at f/1.2 with the Viltrox 35mm LAB lens on the Nikon Z8 at ISO 1600.

There was an interval of 1 second between exposures, thus the gaps in all the trails. The camera was on a tracker following the turning sky, so the stars stay fixed on the frame with minimal trailing, and the satellites streak against the point-like stars.

A version without labels is available.

The World at Night - TWAN
DarkSky International

06/15/2026

This is a 180º by 360º "all-sky" view of the night sky a week before the summer solstice in June 2026. This was from home in rural southern Alberta at a latitude of 51º N. So the sky is not astronomically dark and is lit a deep blue by all-night perpetual twilight. To the north at top the sky is brighter with reddish-yellow twilight but also with green and magenta from a dim aurora that peaked in brightness at about the time I shot these images, but briefly this night. This was at about 2 am MDT, so about in the middle of the night with the sky at its darkest.

South is at bottom, with east to the left and west to the right where the sky is illuminated by light pollution from towns to the west and the city of Calgary. At bottom, the southern sky has bands of natural green airglow.

The northern summer Milky Way runs across the sky from Cassiopeia at top in the northeast, through the Summer Triangle stars left of centre, down to the galactic centre in Sagittarius and Scorpius at bottom low in the south from my latitude. The Milky Way is muted by the bright sky background. The orange star Antares is above the trees at bottom. In the west at right is bright Arcturus. At top right in the northwest is the Big Dipper. Polaris is above centre.

Technical:
This is a stack of 8 x 2 minutes with the AstrHori 6mm fish-eye lens wide open at f/2.8. The lens presents a circular field of view of 220º – so it includes the ground below the horizon. The ground comes from one exposure to minimize blurring. Star glows added manually and with the AstroTools effects panel. No filters were employed here and can't be used on a fish-eye lens like this.

This was with the Canon Ra at ISO 800. The camera was tracking the sky for all exposures on the MSM Nomad tracker. Taken from home on a very clear night June 13, 2026. There were no noctilucent clouds this night! None!

06/11/2026

This frames the pairing of Venus above Jupiter in the evening sky on June 10, 2026. They are over the windy waters of Crawling Lake Reservoir in southern Alberta near Bassano. Above the pair of planets are the stars Pollux (at left) and Castor (at top) in Gemini.

The planets were closest together the night before, June 9, and were beginning to pull apart this night with Venus ascending and Jupiter descending lower each night. Clouds and storms prevented a view on June 9 and only parted for a while this evening.

The night was windy so there was no chance of a reflection of the planets in the water. So instead I used a long exposure to blur the waves, and fortuitously create wave patterns that acted as leading lines to the planet pair.

Taken from the eastern shore of Crawling Lake looking northwest.

Technical:
This is a blend of two exposures —
- a single 1-second for the sky at f/2..8, untracked, plus
- a single 30-second for the ground and water at f/11
- all with the Nikkor 50mm lens on the Nikon Z8 and ISO 100.

Diffraction spikes added in post with AstronomyTools actions.

06/10/2026

This frames the fairly close conjunction of Venus (brightest) above Jupiter in the evening twilight of June 8, 2026. They were 1.75º apart this night. They are over the Badlands landscape of the Red Deer River valley north of Drumheller, Alberta on the "Dinosaur Trail."

The planets are below the stars Castor (above) and Pollux in Gemini, the bright stars at top. Dim Mercury is also in the scene, very low at right just above the normal dark clouds right of centre.

The two bright planets are embedded in what look like glowing noctilucent clouds, as they appear bright and bluish, the characteristic of NLCs. If these are NLCs this was my first sighting of them this 2026 season which lasts from June through July at my latitude of 51º N in southern Alberta.

This was from the Horsethief Canyon Viewpoint looking northwest, with the lingering glow of sunset at right. I picked the site as it offered the best prospects for a lack of clouds this evening, choosing it over another site in the foothills which looked to be cloudier, which I think it was.

Technical:
This is a blend of exposures to capture the wide dynamic range of the scene:
- A single 30-second exposure at f/5.6 for the dark ground
- A single 2-second exposure at f/4 for the bright sky
- plus another 2-second shot through a Maven Starwalker filter to add the slight glows to the planets to make them stand out.
- plus another 2-second shot through a Tiffen Starpoint filter for a starburst diffraction effect to have as an option, which I blended in here for artistic effect.

All with the Nikon Z8 camera at ISO 100 and Nikkor S-line 24-120mm lens at 27mm, with the camera on an MSM Nomad tracker, with the tracker on for the sky images (to prevent trailing and to allow easier alignment of the filtered and non-filtered images), but with the tracker off for the ground images.

06/09/2026

This frames the fairly close conjunction of Venus (brightest) above Jupiter in the evening twilight of June 8, 2026. They were 1.75º apart this night.

They are below Pollux in Gemini, the bright star at top. Dim Mercury is also in the scene, very low at right just above the normal dark clouds.

However, the two bright planets are embedded in what look like glowing noctilucent clouds, as they appear bright and bluish, the characteristic of NLCs. If these are NLCs this was my first sighting of them this 2026 season which lasts from June through July at my latitude of 51º N in southern Alberta.

This was from the Horsethief Canyon Viewpoint overlooking the Badlands of the Red Deer River valley north of Drumheller, Alberta. This is looking northwest, with the lingering glow of sunset at right. I picked the site as it offered the best prospects for a lack of clouds this evening, choosing it over another site in the foothills which looked to be cloudier, which I think it was.

Technical:
This is a blend of exposures to capture the wide dynamic range of the scene:
- A stack of 4 x 60 seconds at f/4 for the dark ground
- A single 3-second exposure at f/4 for the bright sky
- plus another 3-second shot through a Maven Starwalker filter to add the slight glows to the planets to make them stand out. I also shot through a Tiffen Starpoint filter for a starburst diffraction effect to have as an option, but have not used it here.

All with the Nikon Z8 camera at ISO 100 and Nikkor S-line 24-120mm lens at 53mm, with the camera on an MSM Nomad tracker, with the tracker on for the sky images (to prevent trailing and to allow easier alignment of the filtered and non-filtered images), but with the tracker off for the ground images.

06/08/2026

It's satellites galore on this late spring night!

This is a time-lapse of the summer Milky Way rising in the east, from twilight until moonrise at the end.

This was on June 6/7, over 2.5 hours. The frames record lots of streaks – while a couple are aircraft, most are satellites, and most will be Starlinks, simply because most of the satellites in orbit are now SpaceX Starlinks. (The aircraft trails all make a dog leg turn at the horizon -- satellites don't do that!)

What you also see are bands of red and green airglow (a natural phenomenon) moving from south to north. At left in the north is the blue glow of perpetual summer twilight and some green low-level aurora.

Technical:
This is from 840 frames, each 10 seconds at f/2 with the Laowa 15mm lens on the Canon R5 at ISO 3200. Processed with LRTimelapse and assembled with TimeLapseDeFlicker with a 2-frame blend, so each trail appears double.