Image Credit & Copyright: Vincent Brady
Explanation: What's happened to the sky? A time warp, of sorts, and a
digital space warp too. The time warp occurs because
this image captured
in a single frame a two and a half hour exposure of the night sky.
As a result, prominent star
trails are visible. The space warp occurs because the picture is actually a
full 360 degree panorama, horizontally compressed to
fit your browser. As the Earth rotated, stars
appeared to circle both
the North Celestial
Pole, on the left, and the South Celestial Pole,
just below the horizon on the right. The above panorama over Arches National
Park in Utah, USA,
was captured two weeks ago during early morning hours. While the eye-catching
texture of ancient layered sandstone
covers the image foreground, twenty-meter tall Delicate Arch is visible
on the far right, and the distant arch of our Milky Way
Galaxy is visible near the image center.
