Incredible Astrophoto: Deep and Wide View of the Milky Way

By Nancy Atkinson - November 26, 2013 at 12:16 PM UTC | Milky Way
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This new panorama of the Milky Way by astrophotographer

Miguel Claro

is really amazing, and you definitely want to click on the image to have access to larger versions! This is an 18-image mosaic taken with a Canon 60Da, with 60 second exposures, and it rivals wide-field images taken by larger ground-based telescopes. The images, were, however, taken from the home of some of the darkest skies and largest telescopes in the world, near Roque de Los Muchahos, in La Palma, Canary Islands. Visible is the hazy band of white light that comes from unresolved stars and other material that lie within the galactic plane, contrasting with interesting shapes within the dark regions of the band, corresponding to areas where light from distant stars is blocked by interstellar dust.

Above is an annotated version of Claro's panorama, and below is one without annotations. Claro provides a d

etailed description at his website

, and also has a

beautiful gallery of images from his visit to La Palma

which includes pictures of many of the telescopes at night, backdropped by star fields and the night sky.

Thanks to Miguel Claro for sharing his images with Universe Today!

[caption id="attachment_106753" align="aligncenter" width="580"]

The Milky Way Galaxy – Deep Sky Wide Field view, captured from Los Andenes, near Roque de Los Muchahos, in La Palma, Canary Island. Credit and copyright: Miguel Claro. [/caption]

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Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com