Opis
Description: Winter Milky Way panorama bursting with Geminid meteors over the world’s largest optical telescope: Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC)!
My first La Palma trip was a wild rollercoaster with Dan: Storm Emilio, summit snow, fierce winds, rainy clouds, clear skies, meteor showers, and epic memories that’ll last forever!
First 3 nights stuck south of the island—road to Roque de los Muchachos Observatory closed, hunting clear skies. Thought we’d never summit… then Day 4: Road open! We raced up grinning ear-to-ear, excitement bubbling inside hard to describe.
We scouted compositions, prepped for night—then clouds rolled in. “Nooooo!”
“Are we out of luck?” Desire for shots too big to quit! Nervously paced astronomy residence, sky-checking nonstop… ~00:00, stars peeked out . Dashed to GTC: Starry heavens above, low clouds below, telescope gleaming majestic! No opening due to humidity, but indescribable—first time under such dark skies, like 3D Milky Way render!
First time Gum Nebula capture—unique!
2-week edit taught me tons. Meteors are registered with Auriga RegiStar from our 6 cams we captured over 5 nights on La Palma. All RGB frames are captured with Capture the Night Astro filter by Capture the Atlas only.
The full res image is 400mpx big, but anyway, enjoy this cosmic show!
Every time I am gonna look at this photo, my thoughts will fly back to that magical island with unforgettable experience we had!
Big thanks to Dan ( Capture the Atlas ) and Gianluca Lombardi, the GTC manager, who arranged it all and let us photograph right by the telescope and sleep in the Astronomical Residence on top of La Palma. Truly grateful!
Ohhh and one last thing… I’ll NEVER forget Dan’s killer Papas Arrugadas and me frying that jamón ibérico like a pro.
Best food reward after those wild nights!
Gear:
Nikon Z6IIa
Sigma 20 1.4 Dg Dn + Viltrox E-Z adapter
Sony 14 1.8 GM
Capture the night Astro filter by Capture the Atlas
Astronomik H-alpha 12nm MaxFR
Focus on star mask: https://focusonstars.com/ref/
Category: Deepscape/tracked/stacked/blended/focus stack
Exif:
- Sky: 20mm, 13panels, iso1600, f1.8, 4x 60s per panel ( all of the frames shot only with filter oattached on the lens )
- Ha: Sigma 28-45mm, @35mm, iso1600, f1.8, 5x240s per panel
- Foreground: 14mm, 8panels, iso1600, f1.8, 90s
Meteors: all of the meteors registered into panorama using Auriga Registar software
There is around 200meteors we captured during our Astro trip on La Palma using 6 cameras!
Lenses used for capturing meteors: 3x TTArtisian 11mm, 2x Sony 14mm, Sigma 20mm, Sony 20mm, Sony 24mm.
Location and date: La Palma, Rogue de los muchachos observatory – CTAO Telescopes, 15.12.2026
