Clouds and Landscape on a Pristine Night (Gabriel R. Santos (grsotnas))

Clouds and Landscape on a Pristine Night

The Magellanic Clouds are two irregular dwarf galaxies visible from the southern hemisphere, members of the Local Group, orbiting the Milky Way galaxy. These night sights served as important navigation markers, being known since the first millennium in Western Asia. The first preserved mention of the Large Magellanic Cloud is by the Persian astronomer Al Sufi. In Europe, the Clouds were first observed by Italian explorers Peter Martyr d'Anghiera and Andrea Corsali at the end of the 15th century. Subsequently, they were reported by Antonio Pigafetta, who accompanied the expedition of Ferdinand Magellan on its circumnavigation of the world. The naming the clouds after Magellan did not become widespread until much later. [Paragraph adapted from Wikipedia]

This is a 2 panel panormic image of the southern view on that early morning in July. That is, by far, not my greatest image: it has really little exposure time, and, so, SNR suffers. However, my objective with it was not to capture a deep sky photo of the objects, but to capture their beauty as a landscape/nightscape scene. To the lower right hand corner light pollution from nearby city of Itajubá can be seen, despite my attempt to reduce the gradient.

Even though this image was acquired over 4 months ago (as of nov-16), this is the view that is now seen during the beginning of the night due South. The beautiful naked-eye, bright and huge galaxies, LMC and SMC, are, indeed, a sight to behold.

*Please check the full image 1800px - resized from original)*

Constructive criticism, comments and suggestions are more than welcome in the comments section. Thank's for taking your time to look at this image.

Taken from Rural Skies (Bortle 3-4; NELM ~6.2; SQM ~21.6*calculated), from Cristina, MG, Brazil (22ºS latitude).

Date and Time: July 14th, 2016, at 4:30h (UTC-3, start of capture)

Camera: Unmodded Canon T5/1200D, at ISO 3200

Lens: Canon 18-135mm STM lens, at 18mm, f/4

Mount: Sky-Watcher HEQ5, tracking, unguided

Exposure Detail: 2x60s (total 4min), panorama

Objects of the South - negative declination only
Cloudy Nights
Camera Lens Astrophotography

	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
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Extremely wide field
Star trails
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Noctilucent clouds
Landscape
Artificial satellite

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