Christmas passed in a haze of alcohol/food/family/presents and fun and I’ve managed very little photography. However I think I’ve found a new pet project to keep me busy of the next few month.

We’ve been staying with the folk’s right out in the sticks and I noticed on a couple of nights that the really clear evenings combined with the lack of local light pollution produced an amazingly bright night sky, with the milky-way a shimmering ribbon laid across the vivid starfield.

Suitably insulated against the knawing cold (Northface jacket, silly hat and lots of rum) I assembled my tripod and set about trying to get a decent exposure. It was a lot trickier that anticipated. So far i’ve shot 2 nights and i’m still not happy. I’ve included the best pic so far…

There are a number of problems i’ve got to  overcome. Noise levels induced by such long exposures (but I think I’ve sorted that out now), but the most annoying is the sudden cloud cover that instantly extingushes the celestial display. It’s hard to photograph something thats no longer there! Anyway I’ve a few more days here, and several more months of long nights on which to practice and refine the technique. So i’ll keep you posted and expect to see an awesome limited edition print of a galaxy far far away, very soon.