<![CDATA[Scenes from a Southern Star Party]]>

Last week, northerners marvelled at the splendours of the southern hemisphere sky from a dark site in Australia.

I’ve attended the OzSky Sky Safari several times and have always come away with memories of fantastic views of deep-sky wonders visible only from the southern hemisphere.

This year was no exception, as skies stayed mostly clear for the seven nights of the annual star party near Coonabarabran, New South Wales.

About 35 people from the U.S., Canada and the U.K. attended, to take in views through large telescopes supplied by the Australian branch of the Texas-based Three Rivers Foundation. The telescopes come with the best accessory of all: knowledgeable Aussies who know the southern sky and are delighted to present its splendours to us visiting sky tourists.

The lead image above shows a 360° panorama of the observing field and sky from early in the evening, as Orion sets in the west to the right, while Scorpius rises in the east to the left. The Large Magellanic Cloud is at centre, while the Southern Cross shines to the upper left in the Milky Way.

This is a stitch of 8 panels, each with the 14mm Rokinon lens at f/2.8 and mounted vertical in portrait orientation. Each exposure was 2.5 minutes at ISO 3200 with the Canon 5D MkII, with the camera tracking the sky on the iOptron Sky Tracker. Stitched with PTGui software with spherical projection.

This panorama, presented here looking south in a fish-eye scene, is from later in the night as the galactic core rises in the east. Bright Jupiter and the faint glow of the Gegenschein are visible at top to the north.

Each night observers used the big telescopes to gaze at familiar sights seen better than ever under Australian skies, and new objects never seen before.

This is a stack of 4 x 5 minute exposures with the Rokinon 14mm lens at f/2.8 and Canon 5D MkII at ISO 1600, all tracked on the iOptron Sky Tracker, plus one 5-minute exposure untracked of the ground to prevent it from blurring. The trees are blurred at the boundary of the two images, tracked and untracked.

Observer Looking at Orion from Australia

This is a single untracked 13-second exposure with the 35mm lens at f/2 and Canon 6D at ISO 6400.

Carole Benoit from Calgary looks at the Orion Nebula as an upside-down Orion sets into the west.

This is a single untracked 10-second exposure with the 35mm lens at f/2 and Canon 6D at ISO 6400.

John Bambury hunts down an open cluster in the rich southern Milky Way near Carina and Crux.

This is a single 13-second untracked exposure with the 35mm lens at f/2 and Canon 6D at ISO 6400.

David Batagol peers at a faint galaxy below the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy to our Milky Way.