Photo of the week: the zodiacal light

The zodiacal light

It’s a funny thing, but the photos look very different on the desktop computer to the laptop – I hope this looks reasonable on your computer or phone..

You can only ever see the zodiacal light in really dark places, in the east about an hour before dawn, or in the west an hour after sunset. I took this photo from my balcony.

It’s caused by dust in the plane of the planets, which reflect just a little sunlight around to the night side of the planet.

Obviously I still have a lot to learn about night photography and photo processing, but I’m definitely improving.

Posted by sheila

Sheila came to La Palma with a six month contract and has stayed 24 years so far. She used to work as a software engineer at the observatory, but now she's a writer and Starlight guide.

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