Kristian Salo Photography

10/11/2020

Light pollution is a problem that has long been underestimated. According to a study in 2016, 80% of the world and over 99% of European and the U.S. populations live under light-polluted skies. There are increasing number of people that have never seen the Milkyway! Night time artificial light is getting brighter and more extensive every year. it causes problems to animals and changes their behaviour, but it also affects to cirkadian rhythm of humans. It is a health risk and also blocks our view to the beautiful night sky. It is estimated that 35% of artificial light is wasted to the sky because of poor shielding or placement. That means we are paying billions of euros per year just to illuminate our sky!

This photo is taken in Seitseminen national park, about 50km from Tampere. The Milkyway is visible at the zenith and some structure can be seen, but on the horizon it is lost due to light pollution. In photography it is possible to fight against light pollution with filters and digital processing techniques, but nothing beats the feeling under true dark skies.

31/07/2020

Dark and moody portrait shoot with talented Ako Tdb

24/07/2020

Noctilucent clouds above Turku

18/07/2020

Night sky is still too bright to get a decent photo from the comet, but now there have been beautiful noctilucent clouds all night long. Noctilucent clouds are composed of tiny ice crystals at a height of about 80 km. Those are highest clouds in Earth's atmosphere and can be seen only in the night time when the Sun is below the horizon, but clouds high in the sky are still illuminated by sunlight.

13/06/2020

23/04/2020

Wide field image of nebulae in the constellation Cygnus. The bright star at the top is Deneb, the tail of the swan. Bright star at the center right is Sadr and it is the center star of the Cygnus. Both are visible to a naked eye.

Red nebulae are clouds of interstellar gas, mostly hydrogen, ionized by hot young stars. On the left there is the North America nebula (obvious resemblance) and right next to it is the Pelican nebula (a little harder to see, but there is a shape of a pelican). The apparent size of the North America nebula is more than four times that of the full moon, but it needs exeptionally good observing conditions to be seen without binoculars.

The Gamma Cygni nebula, also known as the Sadr region, is a diffuse emission nebula around Sadr. The Sadr region contains many notable deep sky objects such as the Cresent nebula, which is barely visible at the right edge of the image.

17/04/2020

Widefield image of M101, also known as the Pinwheel galaxy. The Pinwheel galaxy is a spiral galaxy 21 million light years away from earth and it can be found in the constellation Ursa Major. It has around a trillion stars, which is twice the number of stars in the Milky Way.

This image has about 2,5 hours of integration time. I was hoping to get some more, but nights are getting brighter and brighter. Only few days left and dark skies are gone for the summer. I had to stretch the data a bit too far so the quality isn't the best possible. I'll just have to wait till fall to get more data.

04/04/2020

Venus and the Pleaides conjunction with passing clouds. Although, Venus seemed to pass right through the star cluster, there is roughly 400 light years of social distance in this close encounter.

03/03/2020

Earthshine happens when sunlight reflects from earth and illuminates the shadowside of the moon. Just like moonshine illuminates our nights. This is a composite image where two different exposures - one for the shadowside and one for the brightside - are combined to create a high dynamic range image with details on both sides.

29/02/2020

The Moon and Venus

04/01/2020

The Orion Nebula (M42) is one of the most brightest nebulae in the night sky and is visible to the naked eye. It is located 1350 light years from earth in the constellation of Orion. New stars are being born from the dust clouds and also protoplanetary disks have been found, making it possible to study solar systems formation mechanisms.

02/10/2019

Next week I'm again climbing to mountain tops to photograph Swiss airforce Axalp 2019 practice. It is fifth year in a row I make this trip and I can't wait to be back at the Alps. This year I may try something different and climb to the other side mountain called Wildgärst. That means more hiking and better preparations.