Clouds that shine in the night

pyry

This was the widest and brightest set of noctilucent clouds I have ever seen. I shot these near my home on 16-17.7.2008 around 2 am. NLCs are fairly common at my latitude in the summer, but they are hardly ever this bright and practically never expand all the way to the horizon in the south.

I made an overhead panorama out of this, so the north horizon in front is at the bottom (right way up), scroll up to meet the horizon toward the south (behind, upside down).



Tell me what you think! :thumb

Mr. 2H2O

It reminds me of when I was a kid and I used to spin around and get really dizzy, then lay on the ground and feel the universe spin all around me.

- Mike

geospatial_junkie

Very cool view! Nice shot!

Llywellyn

Very nice. I was hunting down images of noctilucent clouds not too long ago for a NASA project. I find them beauitful and mystifying. Love your perspective on this.

pyry

Thanks very much for your kind words

I've offered the shot (and it's twin) to NASA's APOD, Sky & Telescope Magazine and a local astronomy magazine. We'll see if it's good enough to publish (fingers crossed)

Skippy

pyry wrote:

This was the widest and brightest set of noctilucent clouds I have ever seen. I shot these near my home on 16-17.7.2008 around 2 am. NLCs are fairly common at my latitude in the summer, but they are hardly ever this bright and practically never expand all the way to the horizon in the south.

I made an overhead panorama out of this, so the north horizon in front is at the bottom (right way up), scroll up to meet the horizon toward the south (behind, upside down).
Tell me what you think!

Pyry it's fantastic all the best with your offer to NASA.
Awesome Shot :ivar .... Skippy
.

Vysionous

I love this pyry, great great great sky.

DaddyO

This is one of the most sweet shots of its kind I have seen period.
Excellent job!

pyry

Skippy wrote:

Pyry it's fantastic all the best with your offer to NASA.
Awesome Shot :ivar .... Skippy

Vysionous wrote:

I love this pyry, great great great sky.

DaddyO wrote:

This is one of the most sweet shots of its kind I have seen period.
Excellent job!

Thanks a lot!

I'll let you know, if Nasa or the mags pick my photo

cmorganphotography

Creativity is hard but this looked pretty easy. I see a line artifact about 1/3 from the bottom where one photo was stitched to another. It's not huge but I can see it... maybe the clouds weren't lined up. Hope that's a help out?
I like the velvety blue of the sky and the little gem at the bottom with a little bit of sunset.

pyry

cmorganphotography wrote:

Creativity is hard but this looked pretty easy. I see a line artifact about 1/3 from the bottom where one photo was stitched to another. It's not huge but I can see it... maybe the clouds weren't lined up. Hope that's a help out?
I like the velvety blue of the sky and the little gem at the bottom with a little bit of sunset.

The individual shots aren't blended together along any predictable lines.
I used CS3 Photomerge, the layer masks have more bends nooks and crannies than should be strictly necessary.

There is a spot around where you described, where the cloud seems to repeat itself, I checked that one and it's there in the individual frames, it's a real feature.

Thanks for the feedback!

cmorganphotography

I will never claim to understand nature.

pyry

cmorganphotography wrote:

I will never claim to understand nature.

I hear ya

pyry

The picture scored an entry into the local astronomy association's observation database.

Cloud types listed: I (veils), IIa (soft bands), IIb (sharp bands) and IVc (large swirly things), scored a full 5/5 on brightness and 4/5 on sky coverage.

Now, I took the picture solely because it was incredibly pretty out there, but this is kinda cool

mmroden

that is a very excellent shot-- I get both dizzy looking at it and wishing I could go stargaze. Kinda hard to do that in LA, though...

pyry

mmroden wrote:

that is a very excellent shot-- I get both dizzy looking at it and wishing I could go stargaze. Kinda hard to do that in LA, though...

Isn't the Kitt Peak Observatory somewhere near there? I'd go visit if I was there

Thanks for the comment