Sky at Night

Perigee full moon from Friday January 29th 2010. The biggest full moon of the year. Astronomers call it a "perigee Moon," because it some 14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons of the year. The Moon's orbit around Earth is not a circle but an ellipse, with one side 50,000 km closer to Earth than the other. Astronomers call the point of closest approach "perigee," and that is where the Moon will be Friday 29th night through Saturday 30th morning. Olympus E3, 90-250mm, x2 TC, F10, 1/250s, ISO 100

Same as last shot but with plane trails taken out of exposure. Gorgeous all night startrail from Dec 20th 2009. I set up the camera pointed towards Polaris at 1700hrs on 20th and exposed every 15s until 0600hrs the following morning of 21st. Over 2500 exposures were then stacked in software to produce this stunning effect, showing earths rotation. The pale pink colour is the effect of clouds rolling through the exposure. Looks like I have also caught a meteorite (top right). Captured with Olympus E3, 12-60SWD lens on 800 ISO.