I’ve never felt compelled to write about solely one image that i’ve taken. Usually it is a series of images discussing a particular topic or lesson. However, this photograph is possibly my proudest one to date. I’ll show a few astro shots in this blog but the one at the end is the center piece.

I am obsessed with skies. Anyone that knows me knows that, with starry skies being no exception. When we were young, growing up in the countryside, we became accustomed to seeing the stars. Being so far from any city or big town, light pollution amounts were low enabling us to see the stars on any given clear night when the moon was not shining big and bright (a rhyme, wow!). We would spent nights lying out on the small boreen and gazing up. It was incredible.

So naturally when i picked up the camera, astrophotography was going to be a keen interest.

Astrophotography is possibly one of the toughest genres to get right. Imagine the difficulties involved in finding a composition during the daytime, nailing your settings, focus, positioning the camera correctly, framing the shot etc and now add in complete darkness to that scenario. That is the challenge that astro photographers face.

The journey of astrophotography generally begins with shooting the milky way. That majestic galaxy in which we live containing stars that cannot be distinguished with the naked eye. If you nail a milky way or night sky shot in the early days, more than likely your foreground is completely dark. And that is ok, you are at the beginning of your journey and seeing that milky way pop up on the lcd is a joy in itself.

But as you progress, you want to start thinking more about composition, about your subject. You want to start telling a story through your astrophotography. This is when you begin learning about shooting foregrounds in the dark, exposing correctly for them and blending separate images for the sky and the foreground.

The image above is an example of where i blended a foreground exposure with a sky exposure. This article isn’t going into my full astrophotography workflow, i have a video on that if you want to check it out here

I’ve digressed slightly but i wanted to set some context to this blog. There was one week in March of this year where the aurora activity was particularly high due to sun spots producing flares and setting off geomagnetic storms. When this happens, the northern lights occur. If the activity is strong enough they can be seen here in Ireland (among many other countries obviously). I had always wanted to photograph the aurora, it was a dream of mine. Usually if i see a chance for a photo i take it, no matter what. On the first night i travelled nearly 3 hours to Co Mayo, specifically the north coast of mayo to a place called Downpatrick Head. Setting up around 9:30pm i eagerly awaited the flickering of the aurora and to see it pop up on my LCD. It was not until 11:30pm that i got my first image of that night. Mind you it was freezing, a cold northerly wind of between 12-15mph meant i had to stand arms spread alongside my tripod to try shelter it from the wind. But i got the shot and you can see it down below

Downpatrick Head Aurora - Nikon Z6 with 14-30 f4 lens.

I also wanted to shoot the milky way the same night. Note the milky way was not rising until 4:00am, so around midnight i packed up my gear and drove the hours spin to Wild Nephin National park, a dark sky reserve in Mayo. What a place. I slept for an hour in the car and around 3:30am walked out to get setup for the milky way. I aligned my star tracker with polaris and while waiting for the core to rise i scoped out my composition. A boardwalk provided me with the perfect scene to shoot the milky way over. Not only did i get to shoot the milky way but the large aurora storm we had been expecting hit and i got a stunning display of the lights in Ballycroy. Both images can be seen below

Milky way over boardwalk in Ballycroy, Co Mayo. Tracked sky at f4, ISO 1200, 3 minutes

Nikon Z6, 20mm f1.8g. ISO 8000, F2.0, 10 seconds

If you’re still with me, well done. So now i’ve been awake for just over 24 hours (by the way I do not condone or encourage this, it is not healthy and particularly when driving if you ever feel tired, pull in and sleep. I have often had to do this) and i am turning to head home. I arrived back in limerick around 9am, uploaded my images for fear of card failure, ate, showered and slept. Waking up at around 2 in the afternoon i check the various weather apps I use and see that clear skies are once again promised. With ambitions to head back up to mayo for hope of an even stronger display i get my gear ready and prepped once again along with my usual food and clothes for a long night under the stars. However the weather changes and now the only part of the country with clear skies is south and south west. My friend Paul who is also a talented photographer had often mentioned shooting the milky way in one of the most remote parts of Ireland, West Cork. A place called Three Castle Head, said to be haunted by the banshee and a woman in a white dress. But my god did it look like an appealing location for the milky way!

With a plan to head to West Cork i went to sleep at 7pm, woke up at 11pm and drove an hour and half down to Paul’s homeplace. The journey from my house to Three Castle Head is just over 3 hours so thankfully Paul volunteered to drive the remainder of the journey. I won’t lie, my body was in bits. I was vomiting from a combination of tiredness and travel sickness. So the journey down was grim. However, we arrived and made the 30 minute hike in from the road to Three Castle Head. There is a donation box for 3 euro as you are crossing private land so please pay your dues and respect the land.

What unfolded over the course of the next 3-4 hours was the most exciting and enjoyable night of photography for us. Our primary goal was to shoot the core of the milky way and then grab a foreground shot of the castles just as twilight was approaching. As the core rose above the mountains we grabbed the images for the sky and the made our way to setup for the twilight. However, i had failed numerous times to grab a decent panoramic image of the milky way and i told myself “you have one image in the bag, the journey was not a waste so why not just give it a go with nothing to lose”. So we made our way to the opposite headland nearest the ocean to try and capture a full pano of the sky arching over this incredible location. As we panned from right to left and began shooting the northern skies, Paul said to me “Sean, is light pollution meant to be purple?” i laughed and said “no it certainly is not”. I have shot enough astro to know that light pollution is a horrible orange and yellow glow in the sky. But as i reviewed the images popping up on my lcd, my jaw dropped. AURORA! The incredible thing about this was not the display itself as it was quite faint but the fact that there were photographers all around the north of Ireland hoping to capture a glimpse only to be clouded out of it. Where as we were in one of Ireland’s most southerly points and could see it. Incredible! So we continued to shoot our pano, we grabbed our foreground shots for the castles and then with full SD cards made our way back to the car. A cup of tea, some snacks and a tired drive home followed. My stomach was still in bits, i could hardly stay awake. So much so that when we arrived at my car and it was my turn to drive i had to go for a 20 minute walk to wake myself up. I wanted to go for a coffee but my stomach could not handle it.

Anyway, i arrived home safely, i showered and went straight to bed. However i could only sleep for 3 hours, i knew what i had on that camera and was keen to get them processed. I won’t bore you with any more details as this is quite a long story already but i got them onto the computer, my pano stitched and well an image to remember was created. All i can say is, this is why we do what we do. Thanks for reading

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Two nights of Astrophotography and one image to remember