Taking pictures of the night sky has always been a solo enterprise for me.  There are few friends or partners willing to endure the long hours of dark cold nights.  I do not blame them; it is a crazy activity that few others share.  The closest I’ve found is our local astronomy club which hosts star parties to observe celestial objects, that can last all night.

But there are a few others as well:  landscape photographers who are looking to present more of the night than a view through a telescope.  They want to show the full scene, land and sky, and depict the magic feeling one has while viewing it at night.

I was thrilled to learn about the Nightscaper Photo Conference.  I had no idea that there were so many others out there doing what I have been doing. Enough that it makes sense to bring them together at a conference where they share their techniques and their images to educate and inspire each other.

I also learned that this community offers night photo workshops, where an instructor or two take small groups to photogenic dark sky locations and spend several nights shooting.  I would normally never join such a group, but after realizing that my superpowers for this activity were fading, and wanting to remain safe in the remote locations I like to visit, I decided to subscribe to one.  I signed up for the Moab, Utah workshop hosted by a small company of nightscaper photographers, “National Parks at Night”.

I wasn’t sure how it would go.  Having done this on my own all these years and resenting any intrusion by other humans into my scene space, I thought we might get in each other’s way.  This turned out to be not a problem, because these humans were all cooperative, and considerate.  All of us were after the same thing, and there was plenty of room to spread out and do it.  Yes, there were occasional unintentional light trespasses, but they were always forgiven.  A small cost for the comfort of being in a supportive group.

I will have more to say about my workshop experience.  But for now, I want to convey that it was a great success—I was able to take pictures from wonderful sites, enjoy the safety and security of being in a group, and to get one of my best shots of the Milky Way ever!

Not every night was ideal.  Clouds persisted the first night, and haze intruded the third.  But this is part of the mystique.  We can place ourselves at the right time and location, but the weather will be what it will be.  It can be disappointing and discouraging, but I encountered a new way of thinking about this at the conference.  Ken Lee, who presented a strategy for maintaining a photographer’s creative spark, advised us to pack the gear and just go out.  It might not result in that next great shot; you might not even unload the gear, but “you have already won!”  You are out under the night skies, taking it in.  Enjoy it, savor it.  Anything more is bonus material.  

On the nights of the workshop, as the twilight faded to reveal a canopy of stars and as we anticipated the rising of the Milky Way, and even before I had taken my first exposures, I thought, “I have already won!”   And that is the feeling I’d like to capture in my pictures.

I will eventually create a timelapse, but here is a frame from my exposures that night.