Annular eclipse shot wins astronomy image of the year

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The overall winner of Royal Observatory Greenwich’s Astronomy Photographer of the Year 16 is Ryan Imperio for his photograph, Distorted Shadows of the Moon’s Surface Created by an Annular Eclipse, that captures the progression of Baily’s beads during the 2023 annular eclipse.

The image will be on display alongside the winners of the other categories in the accompanying exhibition, opening at the National Maritime Museum on September 13.

Sun category and overall winner

Distorted Shadows of the Moon’s Surface Created by an Annular Eclipse © Ryan Imperio (USA)

This is a sequence of continuously captured images showing the progression of Baily’s beads at third contact during the 2023 annular eclipse. Baily’s beads are formed when sunlight shines through the valleys and craters of the Moon’s surface, breaking the eclipse’s well-known ring pattern, and are only visible when the Moon either enters or exits an eclipse. These are a challenge to capture due to their brevity and the precise timing needed.

Taken with a Nikon D810 camera, iOptron SkyGuider Pro mount, Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary lens, 600 mm f/8, ISO 640, multiple 1/1,000-second exposures.

Aurorae category winner

Queenstown Aurora © Larryn Rae (New Zealand)

The Aurora Australis captured above the mountains in Queenstown. It is a 19-image panorama capturing all the fast-moving beams that lit up the sky in February 2023. The photographer used an astro-modified camera to capture all the pink hues of the aurora which makes for an incredibly dynamic final image.

Taken with a Canon EOS R5 H-alpha modified camera, 35 mm panorama f/2.8, ISO 3,200, Sky: 8 second-exposure, Foreground: 30-second exposure.

Our Moon category winner

Shadow peaks of Sinus Iridum © Gábor Balázs (Hungary)

This photograph shows Sinus Iridum, also known as the ‘Bay of Rainbows,’ a 260-kilometre diameter bay bordered by several smaller craters. The photographer used a monochrome camera with a filter to capture the area. The crater visible in the upper right corner, Pythagoras, is particularly noteworthy and is almost visible from the side due to the libration, the wavering of the Moon as viewed from Earth.

Taken with a Heyde-Zeiss refractor telescope, ZWO green filter, ZWO ASI178MM-pro camera, 4,500 mm f/15.

Location: Budapest, Hungary, September 10, 2023.

Galaxies category winner

Echoes of the Past © Bence Tóth, Péter Feltóti (Hungary)

This picture shows the galaxy NGC 5128 and its surrounding tidal wave system as well as a visualization of the relativistic jet, powerful jets of radiation and particles travelling close to the speed of light. This interesting target can only be shot from the southern hemisphere, so the photographers travelled to Namibia to capture the image.

Taken with a Custom-built 200/800 Newton astrograph telescope, Astronomik Deep-Sky LRGB filters, Antlia V-Pro LRGB filters and Antlia 3 nm H-alpha bandpass filter, Sky-Watcher EQ6-R Pro and Sky-Watcher EQ6 mounts, ZWO ASI2600MM Pro camera, 800 mm f/4, 16.2-hour L, 5.3-hour R, G and B, and 5.6-hour H-alpha exposures.

Location: Isabis Farm, Namibia, June 12–16, 18, 20, and 21, 2023.

People & Space category winner

High-Tech Silhouette © Tom Williams (UK)

This H-alpha image of the Sun features the silhouette of the International Space Station (ISS) transiting the eastern solar limb. Crossing the field-of-view in just 0.2 seconds, ISS transits of the Sun are particularly rare for any one location on Earth. The Sun was active and a prominence right next to the station’s transit location can be seen.

Taken with a Sky-Watcher Evostar 120 telescope, Daystar Quark Chromosphere filter, Sky-Watcher EQ3 Pro mount, Player One Apollo-M Max (IMX432) camera, 4,300 mm f/35, ISS: 19 x 0.70-millisecond exposures; Sun: 7,500 x 12-millisecond exposures.

Location: Trowbridge, Wiltshire, UK, June 15, 2023.

Planets, Comets & Asteroids category winner

On Approach © Tom Williams (UK)

This false-color composite shows the phases of Venus on approach to inferior conjunction, which is when Venus and the Earth appear close on the same side of the Sun. Using ultra-violet and infrared filters, the intricate cloud structure within the upper atmosphere of the planet is revealed. Despite Venus’s rotation period being many months long, the atmosphere is far from stationary, circling the planet in around four days. This makes UV imaging of Venus particularly interesting as the planet is much more dynamic than it otherwise would be if viewed in the visible spectrum.

Taken with a Sky-Watcher 400P (16″) Go-To Dobsonian Reflector telescope, Baader Bessel (U)BVRI and RG610 filters, ZWO ASI462MM camera, 5,000 mm f/12.3, multiple 15-millisecond exposures.

Location: Trowbridge, Wiltshire, UK, June 3, 23, and July 6, 2023.

Skyscapes category winner

Tasman Gems © Tom Rae (New Zealand)

This photograph shows the rugged peaks of the Tasman Valley reaching up to the impressive features of the southern hemisphere summer night sky. It includes the hydrogen clouds of the Gum Nebula (central red region) and various other regions of active star formation stretched throughout the fainter arms of the Milky Way. This part of the night sky that tends to be less photographed, due to the faintness of the Milky Way band.

Taken with a Nikon Z 6 astro-modified and Nikon Z7 cameras, iOptron SkyGuider Pro mount, Sigma 40 mm / f/1.4 Art and Sigma 28 mm f/1.4 Art lens, Sky: ISO 1,600, 40 mm f/1.8, 31 x 30-second exposures;

Foreground: ISO 100, 28 mm f/10-14, 9 x 4-second exposures

Location: Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park, New Zealand, December 10, 2023

Stars & Nebulae category winner

SNR G107.5-5.2, Unexpected Discovery (The Nereides Nebula in Cassiopeia) © Marcel Drechsler, Bray Falls, Yann Sainty, Nicolas Martino, Richard Galli (Germany, USA, France, France, France)

This impressive photograph is the result of 3,559 frames, 260 hours of exposure time and telescopes on three continents. The team worked to explore and photograph a previously unknown gigantic supernova remnant (SNR) in the center of the famous constellation Cassiopeia. The international team of amateur astronomers is under the scientific leadership of Professor Robert Fesen (USA). The fact that amateurs have made such a discovery is a testament to how important their role has become in today’s astronomy.

Taken with a Takahashi FSQ-106EDX4 telescope, Sky-Watcher EQ6 Pro and Paramount MyT GEM mounts, QHYCCD QHY600PH-M, ZWO ASI2600MM Pro and ZWO ASI6200MM Pro cameras, 530 mm and 382 mm f/3.6 and f/5, 258 hours 32 minutes total exposure with 60-second, 180-second, 300-second and 600-second subframes.

Locations: Oukaïmeden, Atlas Mountains, Morocco, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA, Avril, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Grand Est, France, Dommartin-lès-Remiremont, Vosges, Grand Est, France, Puzieux, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Grand Est, France and Turckheim, Haut-Rhin, Grand Est, France, July 31, August 1–4, 5–15, September 20, October 6, 7, 9 and 15, November 2–5, 7, 8, 10–12 and 16, 2023.

The Sir Patrick Moore Prize for Best Newcomer winner

SH2-308 (the Dolphin Head Nebula) is at a low angle and can only be shot for five hours a day. This image comprises a total of ten days of shooting and post-processing with PixInsight. The main body of the nebula and the background stellar wind are both prominent.

Taken with a Takahashi TOA-130NS telescope, Sky-Watcher EQ8 mount, ZWO ASI6200MM-Cool camera, 1,000 mm f/7.7, Gain 100, 144 x 600-second H-alpha expo-sures, 140 x 600-second OIII exposures.

Location: Ruo’ergai County, Aba County, Sichuan Province, China, January 6 and 16, 2024.

Young category winner

This image features a deep integration on the California Nebula, NGC 1499, an emission nebula in the constellation of Perseus. It’s located at a distance of about 1,000 light years from Earth and it’s visible thanks to the ionization of gases by the blue giant star ξ Persei (Menkib).

Taken with a ZWO ASI533MC Pro camera, Samyang 135 mm F2.0 lens, Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer mount, 135 mm f/2.8, 263 × 300-second exposures, 228 × 180-second exposures (33 hours 19 minutes total exposure).

Location: Bergamo, Lombardy, Italy, October 7, 8, 11 and 14, November 5, 7 and 8, 2023.

Annie Maunder Prize for Image Innovation winner

This seemingly alien world is actually our endangered planet, Earth, as a distant civilization might study it. This image was created by mixing the 16 bands monitored by the GOES-18 weather satellite to encode land masses, oceans and atmospheric features as different colors.

Original data from GOES-18 ABI (Bands 1 to 16 (0.47 to 13.3 microns)) from 18 February 2024 and Suomi-NPP VIIRS (0.5 to 0.9 microns) from 2012–2020.