Perseids Meteor Adventure

Even though it is the Middle of Summer in the Middle East, I was itching to get out for another photography adventure.  I decided to head to Sir Baniyas Island in the hope that I might be far enough away from city lights to photograph the peak of the Perseids Meteor Shower.  Absolutely nothing there to speak of except an outcrop of rich mineralisation including hematite, salt, gypsum, sulphur (yep, you can see big chunks of sulphur sticking out of the ground) copper and magnesium to name a few. 

The Sheikh, back in the day, decided to turn it into a wildlife sanctuary and planted the entire ~48km² reserve with trees which are 24 hours fully irrigated with over 120,000km of irrigation piped in from the mainland desalination plants.

All of the animals are imported and breed freely.  There are a couple of native animals such as the Arabian Gazelle and Arabian Oryx.  They also have Hyenas, Cheetahs, Ostrich, Emu, that big herd is Eland (Africa’s largest antelope).

Perseids were definitely there! But you have to look closely.

Sequence at 3:02 is where the main event is happening which is a time-lapse taken over three hours.  And then the final still image at the end is a 15 image composite shot of all the best meteors on the one image.  That took quite a while to stitch together!

I took another time-lapse the next night to get a star trail animation around Polaris, just for giggles.

You can catch the full, 2 episode vlog of the adventure on my video page.

Part I Video, Part II Video

Desert Milky Way

Off to the far northern edges of Ras al-Khaimer, this weekend, in search of UAE's highest mountain peak, Jebel Jais.  The rocky range is shared with the neighbouring country, Oman. At just over 1900m, the peak occasionally attracts modest snow fall in winter.  But in the middle of summer, with blistering temperatures of 44C, the only thing this barren landscape was going to attract was a couple of weekend warriors armed with camera equipment and dorky head torches.

It was optimistic to say the least, that a weekend away to capture the Milky Way in the height of the hazy season, was going to be successful.  But I had run out of images to post process in Lightroom and I needed new material by hook or by crook and a reason to try out my newly acquired Samyang 14mm f2.8 prime lens. 

During the day we scouted up the jagged mountain range and decided that the peak lookout would offer a vantage point above the haze as much as possible.  It was also facing southeast which was perfect as that is where the Milky Way rises in the northern hemisphere in the summer time.

We arrived just after sunset and after about half an hour of set up, settled in for a night of time lapse and long exposures.  My favourite image of the night shows the Milky Way rising over the mountain range in all its glory with a small meteor streaking in the sky - in spite of the the light pollution and miasma. 

 

Along the journey I decided to have a crack at vlogging.  So here is my first attempt at making a video.  Be gentle, I only learnt how to edit in Premiere Elements just last weekend.

 

 

Flamingo Fancy

A 4am start saw us at Al Qudra Lakes by 5:15am just in time for sunrise and to see the flamingos come into land on one of the islets within the largest of the lakes.  Al Qudra is a series of man made lakes spread out over 10 hectares and home to more than 100 species of migratory birds. The lakes are located in the plains south east of Dubai.

The flamingos are too far out of reach for my gear, so at this stage I will have to settle for distant silhouettes.