The Man in The Moon?
Learn to take pictures JUST like this at my Kansas workshop check the end of this description for more details!
The Devil’s Garden. Not far from the town of Escalante Utah lies Devil’s Garden. It’s a really cool place with a very baby arch as well (an image to do later). The whole area is covered with what are known as hoodoo’s or as they are sometimes called: Fairy Chimneys. That seems like a perfect description in a place called the Devil’s Garden, but I digress.
The night began very clear and sweltering, probably in the 105-degree range and it made exploring the area to find shots for later that evening an exercise in hydration. I wandered around for a couple miles in a generally circular pattern. I was looking for the small arch that was located here. It is called Metate Arch. Now metate is a stone for grinding corn or seeds and looking at it, you could understand that quickly.
I spent an hour or more trying to find the arch and ultimately gave up. But along the way, I stumbled into this neat rock formation. I immediately saw a man in the moon. I’m sure if you look you will see him slumbering away. So I aligned where the core of the Milky Way would be later and then set up a small rock pile or cairn to mark where to place the camera in the dark.
I wandered about never finding the arch. Later in the parking lot, I met a couple that had taken a picture and gave me a better idea where to look, and it still took 30-40 minutes despite being only 300 yards away.
Satisfied with 4-5 spots for shooting I settled into Jimmy for a bit of a snooze before nightfall. When I awoke, there were 3-4 people with a campfire, drinking and making a fair amount of noise. I asked them if they were going to camp all night but found there lived nearby and were there for a bit to party. I set up a time-lapse camera with a bit of apprehension and headed out to gather images. Arriving at this scene first I found the Milky Way was not yet high enough for the framing I had planned so went on to another shot and returned an hour or so later.
Do you know how to tell how long you need to wait to get an area of the sky to where you want? I do.
So I gathered the image last June, and they sat on my hard drive till a couple days ago when I looked at the sky pictures and went “Oh my!”
So here you go, tons of airglow shooting around the image and what looks to be Aurora to the North (left side of screen)
Check the link below for details on how to take images just like this. Get way ahead of the curve really fast!
Tech: Canon 6D, 50mm f1.6, ISO8000, 42 images stitched on the edges.
