A 360° x 220° fish-eye panorama of the southern night sky, showing the Milky Way all the way across the sky with the centre of the Galaxy directly overhead. The Dark Emu extends from the Coal Sack at upper left to the dark lanes in Scutum at lower right. Venus is rising at right amid the zodical light and some cloud. Mars, at opposition, is just setting behind the trees at left. I shot this at 4:30 a.m. April 11, 2014 from the Two Styx Cabins just outside the boundary of New England National Park, NSW, Australia. This is a stitched panorama composed of 6 segments, each taken with an 8mm fish-eye lens on the Canon 5D Mark II. So while one image with this lens aimed straight up would have recorded a similar scene. taking a panorama of 6 images, at 60° spacings, and stitching them allows the image to extend below the horizon to take in more of the ground, creating a scene that takes in a full 360° in azimuth but more than 180° in altitude. Each segment is a 1-minute untracked exposure at f/3.5 and ISO 4000. So the stars are slightly trailed. The images were stitched in PTGui using the spherical projection mode. Finishing was in Photoshop.
A 360° panorama of the southern hemisphere autumn sky over the observing field at the 2017 OzSky Star Party, at the Warrumbungles Mountain Motel, near Coonabarabran, NSW, Australia. The entire southern Milky Way arches overhead, from Scorpius and Sagittarius rising at left, to Carina and Crux high in the south at centre, to Canis Major and Puppis setting at right. The Large Magellanic Cloud is at right of centre. The formation of the Dark Emu in dark dust lanes in the Milky Way is at centre, rising. Some red bands of airglow discolour the sky. Jupiter is the bright object at left, with the Gegenschein glow at the anti-solar point between Jupiter and the Milky Way. The faint Zodiacal Band can be seen arching across the sky at left, in the northern sky. The Milky Way dominates the southern sky. The South Celestial Pole is above the tree at right of centre. The telescopes on the field are mostly large Dobsonian reflectors in the 18- to 30-inch class, for use of the star party participants. This is a stitch of 8 segments, each 30 seconds at f/2.5 with the Rokinon 14mm lens, in portrait orientation, and with the Canon 6D at ISO 6400. Stitched with PTGui in equirectangular projection.
