Joshua Memories

When I found this spot in Joshua Tree National Park and realized that the Milky Way arcs nicely above the scene, I was very happy about my find.

 

I captured the foreground in the light of the setting Moon and some low-level lights hidden between the rocks. After moonset, the Milky Way perfctly stood in the planned position, and I was able to capture it under excellent conditions.

 

Back at home, I was excited to process the image, but as soon as the panorama appeared on my screen, I had the strange feeling that I somehow knew this image...

 

After some online research, I found that Wayne Pinkston captured an almost identical panorama all the way back in 2015, when I had just started dabbling with nightscapes. Although I had long forgotten that image, I can not exclude the possibility that some unconscious memories made me set up my tripod in almost exactly the same position as Wayne.

 

It certainly is an honor to follow in the footsteps of a great photographer like Wayne, but comp stomping his work is definitely not what I try to do. That's why this image has been sitting unpublished my hard drive for quite some time, while I was wondering what to do with it.

 

Well, I finally decided to publish it anyway, but with a big "Thank you!" to Wayne for all the inspiration he has given me and the community in general in the past years.

 

EXIF

Canon EOS-Ra

Sigma 28mm f/1.4 ART

IDAS NBZ filter

iOptron SkyTracker Pro

Low Level Lighting

 

Sky:

Panorama of 8 panels, each a stack of 6x 45s @ ISO1600, unfiltered & 105s @ ISO6400, filtered

 

Foreground:

Panorama of 8 panels, each a focus stack of 3x 30s @ ISO1600

Done