Space is really empty. If one can realize that light takes 8 minutes to reach the Earth from the Sun, and that there is really nothing in between, it can soon become bewildering to comprehend the vastness of space. Yet, if one looks at a really dark night sky, they can easily observe innumerable stars of different brightness and colors, with the white band of the Milky Way squarely dividing the sky. Whenever I do such an exercise, I succumb to the gravitas of this vast universe, and it makes me realize that we are but a tiny observer on a small mote of dust floating through space.
On a visit to Yosemite to capture the night sky a few years ago, I set up my camera to do about 240 exposures lasting thirty seconds each, capturing two hours of the stars’ motion as they journeyed across and around the dark night skies in the high altitude regions of Yosemite. My original aim was to capture a timelapse sequence (an ongoing project on the mountainscapes of California), but this stacked star-trail was a beneficial side-effect. By pointing the camera at a 90 degree angle to the Polaris, I was able to capture the motion of the stars along the equatorial plane of the earth, which can be seen in the upper half of the image as pure straight lines stretching across the sky. And thanks to the limited light pollution in this mountainous region of California, the empty space appears filled with bright stars!
Yosemite National Park
CA USA
