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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

2020-06-13

Night Sky, Our Connection to the Universe

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I can’t find beauty in the night sky when my motherland is in pain. I’ve paused my usual posts to be a voice for the voiceless Iranians.

A young woman at night on a hilltop in Tehran. This is a tribute to #MahsaAmini, to millions of woman in Iran who has to fight for their freedom, against enforced hijab. Last week Mahsa, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurd woman visiting Tehran, was arrested and beaten by morality police for improper hijab. She died in the hospital. A series of protests are broken out in Iran. I was born in 1978 with the Islamic revolution and lived 33 years in Iran. I witnessed students and journalists disappeared in prison for years, families being arrested for having a private party, women in daily stress of encountering hijab police. The world is unaware of a fact that the current Iranian society is becoming secular. The state claims 99% are practicing Muslims but a reliable 2020 online study shows only 1/3rd of the population consider themselves Muslim. Another 1/3rd of Iranians do not follow any religion (but hide this publicly). The rest fit in other religions. This study by @gamaanresearch was widely published including @theconversationdotcom.

A thin crescent moon rises in morning twilight, captured in a timelapse video a few years ago from the Atlantic shoreline near Boston. Music by composer @barbadbayat, a part of our growing project Celestial Orchestra. #moon #astrophotography #newengland @twanight

Last week under the dark skies of Maine, New England, we hold the annual stargazing and photography retreat with a group of 30 participants and invited speakers. We were fortunate with clear skies for 6 nights and a couple of surprising aurora displays, colorless spikes on the northern horizon to the eyes but strikingly beautiful in the camera. If you are interested to attend the next program please email to office@babaktafreshi.com or tap Email under my bio.

The full moon is rising above Boston Light, filmed with a super telephoto lens from a far distance. This is why the moon appears large in the view. Music by composer @barbadbayat, a part of our growing project Celestial Orchestra.

A great surprise and I’m glad to learn the 2-kilometer wide object that is named after me is not a dangerous near-earth asteroid! It’s safely located in the main asteroid belt and orbits the sun every 5 years. It’s unlikely that I will be ever able to visit Asteroid Tafreshi between Mars and Jupiter, but I look forward to photograph it using a telescope!

The first look at the moon through a borrowed small telescope, from atop my family’s Tehran apartment in 1991, simply changed my life. It felt like being an astronaut floating above the moon’s craters. I’ll remember that scene forever. I’m sure many of you are aware that NASA’s Artemis 1 mission is about to launch using the world’s most powerful rocket which is about 100 meters tall. This is a test unmanned visit to the moon orbit and return to Earth in 42 days; the first for @nasaartemis program that aim to return astronauts to the moon in 2025. We talked more about this and moon photography on a recent IG Live with @NASA (link on my highlighted story Talks).

“Tehran Moontrail”. This long-exposure composite image is resulted from a timelapse sequence, that shows the crescent moon in a colorful dusk, setting behind a tower. The camera was imaging every 2 seconds to make a smooth trail, but when putting this together I skipped some of the last frames to reveal one stand-alone moon at the end. Swipe to see a single shot of the moon and the tower, and wide angle shots taken later in the evening.

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