For those who do not know, auroras are caused by solar activity. This is shortly visualized in the video. Our suns activity varies in 11 year cycles, and we are closing solar maximum (solar max) for our current solar cycle somewhere between 2012-2013, and solar activity has clearly been picking up. The beginning of 2011 was lots of clouds but weather improved late 2011 and out 2012. This video contains recordings from some of the most spectacular auroral displays I have ever witnessed, and I have seen a few.

For this video Ole C. Salomonsen did shoot approx 150.000 exposures from sept.2011 – april.2012 using Canon DSLR’s and various wide angle lenses. To achieve pannings Ole has used the fantastic Stage Zero + MX2 controller time-lapse gear from Dynamic Perception.

The video is a merge of two parts; the first part contains some more wild and aggressive auroras, as well as a few milky way sequences, hence either auroras are moving fast because they are, or they are fast due to motion of the milky way / stars. Still, some of the strait up shots are very close to real-time speed, although auroras mostly are slower, she can also be FAST! The second part has some more slow and majestic auroras, where I have focused more on composition and foreground. The music should give you a clear indication of where you are :)

via:equisdx

Enjoy this Tribute to Yuri Gagarin a short time lapse movie in IMAX quality of an orbit : day and night

Crédits :
Musique : Brian Eno – Stars
Amazing photos taken by crews of the ISS. The Gateway of Astronauts Photography of Earth – http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/
Voice of James Dutton from STS-131 Flight day Highlights 14 / NASA.

Via: equisdx

Timelapse videos depicting the stars from low earth orbit, as viewed from the International Space Station. Images edited using Adobe Lightroom with some cropping to make the stars the focal point of each shot, and with manipulation of the contrast to bring out the stars a bit more.

The video plays best if you let it load a bit first.

First sequence star-trails processed using StarStaX:
markus-enzweiler.de/software/software.html

Music: “Truck out There” by London PM.
Editing by Alex Rivest

Timelapses and images courtesy: The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. The Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center. One of NASA’s best outreach programs, in my opinion.
eol.jsc.nasa.gov/Videos/CrewEarthObservationsVideos/

Dedicated to those who dream of exploring the solar system, and those who are sharing their experiences while doing it.

Astronomer’s Paradise is the first episode of Atacama Starry Nights timelapse movie series. Cerro Paranal is truly an astronomers paradise with its stunningly dark, steady and transparent sky. Located in the barren Atacama Desert of Chile it is home to some of the world’s leading telescopes. Operated by the European Southern Observatory (eso.org) the Very Large Telescope (VLT) is located on Paranal, composed of four 8 m telescopes which can combine their light to make a giant telescope by interferometry. Four smaller auxiliary telescopes, each 1.8 m in aperture, are important elements of the VLT interferometer.

Walking on the desert near Paranal between the scattered stones and boulders on the pale red dust feels like being on Mars but under the Earth sky. It is an amazing experience to be under an ideal night sky, a pure natural beauty unspoiled by urban lights. On Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert you look all around the horizon and there is no prominent sign of city lights, neither direct lights or light domes. There are not many locations left on this planet where you can still experience a dark sky like this. I have been to similar dark skies in other continents from the heart of Sahara in Algeria to Himalayas or islands in the Pacific. But what makes Atacama beat others is being dry and clear for so many nights per year. Paranal was selected for cutting edge astronomical observations also because of the sky transparency and steady atmospheric condition which let astronomers peer in to tiny details in the deep cosmos using giant telescopes.

This footage is made during an imaging expedition to Paranal assigned by the European Southern Observatory (ESO). All video rights reserved by Christoph Malin (christophmalin.com) and Babak Tafreshi (btafreshi@twanight.org) of The World at Night (TWAN) program (twanight.org). The inside observatory video is contributed by Stephane Guisard (astrosurf.com/sguisard).

The music theme is by Carbon Based Lifeforms (carbonbasedlifeforms.net). Song Arecibo extract from the album [Twentythree], write & produced by Johannes Hedberg and Daniel Segerstad, published by Ultimae (ultimae.com). Music remix by Tiny Types.

Video editor: Zapatou (Luc Bergeron)
Music: Wolf – First Aid Kit

Via:equisdx

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

Carl Sagan

The footage in this little film, by Chriss Abbas, was captured by the hardworking men and women at NASA and The European Space Agency with the Cassini Imaging Science System.

Not all images taken by Cassini are sharp as in photo #1 (check #2 or #3) and it takes several months to be processed(validated/calibrated) and archived in NASA Planetary Data System.

Meanwhile you can explore raw images to find next gems.

This is production footage from Tom Lowe forthcoming debut film, “TimeScapes,” a portrait of the American Southwest. This video was filmed and edited at 4K (4069×2304) resolution, four times greater than regular 1080p HD. Shot on Red Epic and Canon RAW still cameras.

You can pre-order the movie “TimeScapes” here: timescapes.org/pre_order.asp
Music by Nigel “John” Stanford: johnstanfordmusic.com

This amazing image was acquired on 9 November 2011 by Envisat’s Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer.