These stunning space photos started circulating around the web back in the summer, but I guess we were too busy having a great time to notice. The images were shot in spring 2012 by NASA astronaut Don Pettit, who was on a mission aboard the International Space Center. Shot at long exposures from 240 miles up in space, the photos show the paths made by stars and earth lights over 10 to 15 minutes.
“My star trail images are made by taking a time exposure of about 10 to 15 minutes,” explains Pettit. “To achieve the longer exposures I do what many amateur astronomers do. I take multiple 30-second exposures, then ‘stack’ them using imaging software, thus producing the longer exposure.”
See the rest of the set on Flickr.
(via The Creators Project)