Milky Way Over Mule Ears Peaks in Big Bend National Park

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The Milky Way rising like a flame behind Mule Ears Peaks, Big Bend NP

Big Bend After Nightfall

There is a distinct kind of quiet that settles over the Chihuahuan Desert once the sun drops below the horizon, leaving behind a sky so vast it makes you feel like you are standing right on the edge of the universe. During a stretch of landscape photography work out at Big Bend National Park in west Texas last fall, I set up to capture the Milky Way rising directly behind the iconic Mule Ears peaks. Standing out there in the dark with the crisp desert air settling in, you realize pretty quickly why this remote corner of Texas is designated as an International Dark Sky Park. Without the ambient light pollution we wrestle with back home in Austin, the core of our galaxy blazes overhead with an intensity that photos can barely start to do justice.

Creating this shot required lining up the composition so the galactic core anchored right between the twin volcanic spires of the Mule Ears. These twin peaks, rising dramatically from the desert floor, are the eroded remnants of an ancient caldera formed millions of years ago through intense volcanic activity. Looking up at them under a canopy of countless stars brings a profound sense of scale. While I initially dabbled in nightscape work only recently after picking up gear like my Vespera Pro smart telescope, scenes like this remind me why chasing these dark skies is worth every minute spent hauling equipment into the backcountry.

Recently, this particular image found a meaningful home when a local healer ordered a 20×20 inch gallery-mounted and commercially framed print from me for her office. Custom framing of that caliber is an incredible way to display fine art if budget is no object, but for anyone looking to get large-scale prints onto their own walls without breaking the bank, a smart workaround is ordering a high-quality matted print and pairing it with a ready-made frame online from Homeforia. You can order from their website as well as on Amazon. Their frames include real crystal clear glass, not murky plastic. It completely skips the steep markup of a custom frame shop while still doing absolute justice to the fine details of the print. The usual less expensive ways to frame fine art include options like using the frame shop at Michaels or buying a cheap frame at Walmart. In my experience, framing your fine art in a manner you’ll be happy with requires some judicious forethought instead of just going for the cheapest route.

We are heading back out to Big Bend for a full week this coming December with some friends, and while the Milky Way won't be visible during those winter nights, the park's pristine skies will offer an endless supply of nebulae and deep-space targets for the telescope. So I’m excited for that and for doing more daytime landscape photography to share with ya’ll here in the blog.

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