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.
A 360° panorama taken in the pre-dawn hours (4:45 a.m.) on December 8, 2013, from the Painted Pony Resort in SW New Mexico. The panorama takes in, from left to right: • Arcturus just on the treetop • the zodiacal light rising up from the east • red Mars embedded in the zodiacal light below Leo • the Milky Way from Puppis and Canis Major at left arching up and across the sky down into Perseus at right • Sirius the brightest star • Orion setting over the main house • Jupiter, the bright object at top centre in Gemini • Aldebaran and the Pleiades setting right of the main house in Taurus • Polaris over the smaller house at right • the Big Dipper pointing to Polaris at upper right • a green glow along the northern horizon above the smaller house that may be some aurora (there was a good display this night from northern latitudes) or may be intense airglow. • green and red bands throughout the sky are airglow • bands of high cloud also permeate the sky adding natural glows around the stars. This is a panorama created in PTGui software from 6 segments, all tracked, taken with the 14mm Rokinon lens at f/2.8 for 2.5 minutes each and with the Canon 5D MkII at ISO 1600. PTGui does not preserve EXIF data.
