Hoodoos In The Bisti Badlands By Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: This Photo Was Taken In The Bisti Badlands

From a Watery Origin by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Tufas arising from their watery origins. These tufas are composed of calcium carbonate which precipitates out of the water from springs lying along the lake bed over millennia. Some are seen arising from the lake while others are now exposed on land after the shoreline has receded. Stacked image for the sky, long exposure for the foreground (3 minutes at ISO 1600).

Moccasin Arch by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Panorama, 4 images, 14 mm, f/2.8, 25 sec., ISO 8000 Moccasin Arch in Monument Valley. The Arch is a huge cavernous alcove with an opening in the side of the "roof". This is a photo of some of my fellow photographers taking photos within Moccasin Arch. I was taking photos of them while they were photographing the arch. It turned out that I liked this one more than my views looking straight outward from the arch. The photographers in the photo give you a sense of scale. The Arch is huge! A big thank you to Quanah from Majestic Monument Valley Tours for taking us there. Thank you! He is highly recommend if you want to take a night tour in Monument Valley (day tours also). Thanks for all the kind support over the last year, it is much appreciated! A big thank you to the wonderful Flickr family!

Joshua Tree by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website Instagram Facebook A Night in Joshua Tree. A photo from the my archives, reprocessed. For more images like this please take a look at my website here .

Fairyland Canyon on Flickr.

Fairyland Canyon in Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah. Lighting set up by Royce Bair in one of his workshops.

Questions and Answers

Airglow

 People have asked me a number of questions about equipment, issues, and technique in Nightscape or Landscape Astrophotography. Since many of these questions are recurring, I am going to post the questions and answers here. I’ll answer your questions to the best of my ability!

Q: Why is the sky green?

A: You asked where the green was coming from in the Milky Way photo. The green color is from "airglow" that the camera can image, but you cannot see with the naked eye. In photographs it looks very much like very faint Northern Lights or Aurora Borealis, but occurs anywhere on earth, is best seen when it is very dark, and best seen toward the horizon. It looks odd and so a lot of photographers just try to get rid of it. I like the "otherworldly" look so I enhance it instead. Here is what Wikipedia says: Airglow is caused by various processes in the upper atmosphere, such as the recombination of atoms, which were photo ionized by the sun during the day, luminescence caused by cosmic rays striking the upper atmosphere and chemiluminescence caused mainly by oxygen and nitrogen reacting with hydroxyl ions at heights of a few hundred kilometers. It is not noticeable during the daytime because of the scattered light from the sun.

Hoodoos and Bones by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Oh, if the land could only speak, what a tale it could tell... For tours to this area contact Kialo Winters at Navajo Tours USA. Thanks for all the kind support over the last year, it is much appreciated! A big thank you to the wonderful Flickr family!

Messages from the Past by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Messages from the Past: It seems like a basic human urge to communicate our thoughts to the world. Are our ideas likely to be as long lasting as these carved in rock, or will all of our digital wonderings and our paper renderings fade away over the millennia like dust in the wind? There is something to say for permanence. If only we knew what they were saying... ___________________________________________ Full disclosure: This is a composite image. It was cloudy the night I was there so I did a panorama of the foreground and added the sky in later. Note, the Milky Way and sky are aligned in there proper position so this is not a make-believe scene, but reflects what you would see if the sky was not cloudy. ___________________________________________

Canyonlands National Park by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Panorama Foreground: 16 frames, 30 sec., f/2.5, ISO 2000 (twilight) Sky: 16 frames, 4 exposures each, stacked, f/1.8, 10 sec., ISO 500: All at 35 mm Canyonlands National Park. Panorama with the foreground and sky acquired separately as above. Thanks for looking! Wayne

Boot Arch by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website Instagram Facebook Boot Arch in the Alabama Hills of California. Nikon D810A Camera, 14-24 mm lens, 24 mm, f 2.8, 30 sec., ISO 10,000. Lighting with Low Level Lighting (LLL). For more info about this technique please see www.lowlevellighting.org For more images like this please take a look at Wayne Pinkston Photography . Thanks for all the kind support! Hope you enjoy! A big thank you to the wonderful Flickr family. It's a pleasure to post here. Cheers, Wayne

Window to the World by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Anasazi Part 3: Image... Your picture window is 100 feet (30 m) hight and 200 feet (60 m) wide. It looks out over a wash filled with cottonwood trees, small brush, wildflowers, and intermittenty a small stream. In the distance are ridges and hills, and beyond that is a broad plain or wash where you may grow crops in wetter times. The trail winds up the side of the ridge. The glow of cooking fires illuminates the alcove or cave with a golden glow. Above the plains you look out on a star filled sky and seasonally on the Milky Way. The night sky is woven into your life as naturally as the day. The stars and seasons flow past endlessly. We may have electric lights, TV, movies, You Tube, and Flickr :-) , but the Anasazi or Ancient Puebloans had a view to die for. Since some of the structures are defensive, they may well have died defending their home. The Anasazi or Ancient Puebloans lived in the four corners region of the Southwest USA in pre-columbian times, approximately from 700 AD to 1200 AD, abandoning the area in the 13th century, possibly because of drought. This is a panorama of the Monarch Cave Anasazi Ruins in the Comb Ridge region of SE Utah. There are 11 vertical images combined in Lightroom.. Taken with a Nikon 810A camera and a Nikon 14-24 mm lens at 14 mm, f 2.8, 30 sec., and ISO 6400. There is one very large alcove but separated into two sections. I am sitting on a 30 - 45 degree stone wall that separated the two sections. To the left is the larger section and the easiest to reach. Most of the structures there are destroyed, but there are a few low walls and many pits for grinding grain, as well as some petroglyphs and pictographs. The section to the right is harder to reach and in better condition, with several rooms and rounded walls. A wide overhang unites the two sides. The Milky Way hugs the far left edge of the sky, only partially seen. As a consolation prize, we have the Andromeda Galaxy in the left center sky, the double cluster, and several additional faint galaxies. Disclaimer: No ruins were harmed or touched in the making of this photo! Thanks for taking the time to look. Hope you enjoy! Your time, faves, and comments are much appreciated! Please join me at: Website Facebook Blog