A Finnish astrophotographer named JP Metsavainio took over 12 years to complete a photograph of the milky way, and it was more than worth the effort. This astonishing 1.7 gigapixel panoramic photo took an excruciating 1,250 hours of exposure to compile, but the result was absolutely breathtaking. The mosaic-like photo displays the milky way in all of her ethereal beauty, offering an even more mind-blowing perspective to viewers in a way they’ve never experienced before.
According to Metsavainio’s blog, the project actually began all the way back in 2009. It started with him putting 234 individual images together, which displayed quite a large portion of the galaxy as a result. The original image also showed around 20 million of the Milky Way’s 200 billion stars.
Milky Way, 12 years, 1250 hours of exposures and 125 x 22 degrees of sky.
My Milky Way mosaic project gets large, the full size image in my blog is absolute must to see! (7000 x 1300 pixels), https://t.co/doh6Cso1MM pic.twitter.com/K1hzlG4jJ6— J-P Metsavainio (@JP_Metsavainio) March 16, 2021
The astrophotographer explained, “It took nearly twelve years to collect enough data for this high-resolution gigapixel class mosaic image of the Milky Way. The total exposure time used is around 1250 hours between 2009 and 2021. The final photo is about 100,000 pixels wide, it has 234 individual mosaic panels stitched together and 1,7 gigapixels.”
Metsavainio also said that the reason why the image took so long to complete is because of the size of the overall mosaic. He also said that another factor was because the photo is “very deep.”
He went on to explain further, “Another reason is that I have shot most of the mosaic frames as individual compositions and published them as independent artworks.”
My blog alone has over 100 000 visitors yesterday, that's a lot for a art/science blog, https://t.co/RDBarTr7a7 pic.twitter.com/i9UHbCyGLS
— J-P Metsavainio (@JP_Metsavainio) March 18, 2021
Metsavainio shared that he had to use a variety of cameras to create and complete the image. He also had to use more exposure on particular celestial objects in order to get them to pop and not stay dim when the product was finalized. As a matter of fact, one supernova remnant alone actually took around 60 exposure hours to just complete that one alone.
This image was published eight years ago, it's part of the large mosaic image too.
Image info can be seen here, https://t.co/Admns2akw4
(You can buy photos for a short time here, https://t.co/fKRqH4OGwb ) pic.twitter.com/Qw8arpNvBS— J-P Metsavainio (@JP_Metsavainio) March 22, 2021
Metsavainio was also interviewed by media bigwig CNN. He shared with them, “Astronomical photograpy is one of the most difficult forms of nature photography. My mosaic image is generally very deep, meaning that it shows extremely dim targets and formations in gas clouds of our home galaxy, the Milky Way.”
Since his new work of the Milky Way was published and garnered the spotlight, his blog has had at least 750,000 visitors, which is saying a lot from the previous average of around 1,000 viewers a day.
He also shared with the news publication, “The reason I keep doing my slow work is basically an endless curiosity, I love to see and how wonderful our world really is. This is lonely and slow work but every time I see the results, I’m as thrilled as the first time.”
Thankfully, the astrophotographer – who’s admittedly a ‘lover of the night sky’ – claims that he plans to continue doing his work using a different lens. He revealed, “I have shot the night sky with relatively short focal length optics for the last few years. In the future, I’ll go back to a longer focal length instrument.”
And honestly, after fully viewing the colossal image and seeing just how brilliant his work truly is, the world should continue to hope that Metsavainio never decides to stop doing what he’s doing.
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