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Astrophoto: Milky Way Over the Bungle Bungles by Mike Salway

by Nancy Atkinson on July 31, 2012

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Photographer Mike Salway recently took a trip to the western Australia Kimberly Region of the Outback, and has posted some amazing night sky images of his adventures. This picture — and the name of the geologic features — especially caught my eye. The Bungle Bungles of Purnululu National Park are an incredible sight in themselves, huge beehive-shaped sandstone formations. But Mike was able to take a panoramic view of the Milky Way arching over the formations, a symmetrical halo of light in the full sky.

“You know the skies are dark when you can see the Milky Way overhead, even when there’s a more than half-moon shining brightly high in the west sky,” Mike wrote on his website. “And that’s what it was like at the Bungle Bungles.”

This image is an 8 frame panorama, taken on the Piccaninny Creek bed with his Canon 5D Mk II and Samyang 14mm f/2.8 lens.

See more images from Mike’s trip, and all his other work, too, plus check out his IceInSpace website, a collection of amateur astronomer images of the Solar System.

Want to get your astrophoto featured on Universe Today? Join our Flickr group or send us your images by email (this means you’re giving us permission to post them). Please explain what’s in the picture, when you took it, the equipment you used, etc.

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About

Nancy Atkinson is Universe Today's Senior Editor. She also is the host of the NASA Lunar Science Institute podcast and works with the Astronomy Cast and 365 Days of Astronomy podcasts. Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador.

Tagged as: astrophotography, Astrophotos, milky way

  • William Sparrow

    Beautiful image. Thanks Mike!

  • Peter Croft

    Oh, what a great shot! I love it. I’m in Perth and these are “just up the road” from me! Er, about 2,500Km up the road. I’ve never been there but they are amazing. And they all used to be under the ocean, as I understand it, laid down as layers of silt.

  • Vedran Vrhovac

    I would like to move to Australia just to have access to the beautiful dark sky. Here in Europe it is to crowded to avoid light pollution and weather is not cooperating :)

    • SJStar

      Please. I would not bother. They announced today that the Australian Government intends to support a “US bid for multibillion-dollar nuclear aircraft carrier strike group in Perth.”. It apparently comes from a report that will be tabled today (1st August) by the US Government’s “Congress’s Armed Services Committee.”

      Already knowing your likely European sensibilities, you instead might like to go to New Zealand or even South Africa instead! As stated in the first comments with linked article; “There goes the neighborhood!!!” (There are something even the clearest of skies are not worth sacrificing for.) Shame.

      • http://eye-on-space.blogspot.com/ Aerandir90

        Congratulations. Only you can twist a simple comment on astronomy and dark skies into something political and anti-American.

        • SJStar

          It is anti-Australian, actually.

          • William Sparrow

            What Utopian part of Earth are you a resident of? It must be uniquely perfect, as you’ve now insulted all Americans and Australians.

          • SJStar

            Australia. Our entire elected government, both/all major parties, is just as equally stupid as the entire American government.

  • SJStar

    Sorry. I really don’t like the way the false illusions that this guy is continuing to generate and spin. I.e. He really speaks for much fewer people than he claims on his Ice site. IMO, UT perhaps be far more careful and selective in what organisations they promote, and instead, just concentrate or promote the astrophoto or image in question.

    Also it would have been nice to be presented with more basic details, like the time and date of the image was taken, the exposure lengths and even a little bit of info about the processing or enhancements.

    I do, however, if I’m being honest and truthful, have to agree this image is a really an excellent artistic piece. If any simple flaw were to be pointed out, is that the stars are greatly distorted, and it might have been better to do just a basic ‘perspective transformation.’ (Exampled as the attached image.) Here the Pointers and the Cross are in a much more realistic configuration. Comment also, that it would had been an excellent new panorama for the freeware planetarium software like Stellarium.

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