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Babak Tafreshi | Photographer | Explorer | Speaker

National Geographic photojournalist, founder of The World at Night (TWAN), preserving natural night skies, bridging art & science

2020-05-24

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A Winter Night of Alborz. Swipe to see the entire view. It was a crystal clear night of December 2011 in the Alborz Mountains, northern Iran. This image is made from a timelapse sequence of successive frames during several hours. The Earth rotation, turning the sky above us, forms the startrails in long exposures. The brightest trail at the upper right is Sirius, the brightest star in our night sky. The setting moon shines on the mountains and the Haraz road which connects Tehran to the Caspian Sea. Car trails are cut off in two sections by the tunnels. Slides 4-6 shows short single exposures of the sequence as the moonset shades the valley to black.

The story of The World at Night photography, our conservation goals, years of adventures under stars, and the science and art of astrophotography.

Tuscany Night, Sep 2015. Swipe to see the entire view. This long-exposure image reveals the rising stars of constellation Orion, in form of star trails, including a pink trail formed by the Orion Nebula. In the foreground are cypress trees around a beautiful chapel, and an old well in Italy. The trails are resulted from the Earth rotation during this 30-min timelapse sequence.

Swipe to see the entire view. A week ago in the White Mountains, New Hampshire. The evening twilight was fading to the night on this 10-second exposure. The maple trees in fall foliage were softly lit by the moon behind me. Constellation Perseus was rising above the mountains.

New England aurora. Slides 2 & 3 are from Oct 12 early morning at Echo Lake in White Mountains, New Hampshire. First photo is late August in Maine @medomakcamp. All at latitude 44 degrees, nowhere near the Arctic. In fact, if you have open and dark northern horizon, faint aurora is frequently visible at this latitude range in the US, from New England to the Great Lakes and Upper Midwest, to Montana, Idaho, and Washington. Aurora intensity is measured by Kp index from 0 to 9. At about Kp 5 (once a week on average) it becomes notable to the camera in the northern states, while at 7 (once a month on average) it is easily visible to the eye and at severe storm level of 8-9 (every several months) it rises very high in the sky and a red glow could be detected on the horizon from Florida, southern California, Texas, and parts of Mexico! Kp 9 is pretty rare and I was fortunate to see it a few times.

An autumn night in Yosemite National Park, in Nov 2012. The moonlight from behind me revealed the landscape in this single exposure of 15 seconds. Constellations Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, the celestial bears in the northern sky, appear here. Swipe to see them. Most people know them by their prominent figures: big and little dippers. The north star, Polaris, is near the center, marking the Little Dipper’s handle.

Yesterday, on a family day trip to see the fall colors in White Mountain National Forest, New Hampshire. Autumn in New England is truly a natural treasure, one of the reasons I live in Boston area.

The Southern Ocean shoreline near Christchurch, New Zealand. The Milky Way’s galactic core was sinking to the ocean as I was warming hands by a bonfire left from fishermen. The brightest point reflecting on the water is Jupiter against a dark nebula known as the Pipe which also forms a celestial kiwi, the NZ national bird, a non-flying nocturnal bird. Swipe to find the kiwi.

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