The World At Night (TWAN) is an international project to produce and present a collection of high-quality photos, videos, and virtual reality (VR) images of the night sky taken at various natural, cultural, and historic locations worldwide.[1]
Based on the peacemaking slogan of "One People, One Sky", TWAN aims to demonstrate that humanity is one family when considered under the roof of the night sky.[2] According to its website, "TWAN is a bridge between art, humanity, and science. The eternally peaceful sky looks the same above all the landmarks and symbols of different nations and regions, attesting to the truly unified nature of Earth as a planet rather than an amalgam of human-designated territories."[3]
Access
This imagery is available for viewing on the TWAN website, through media contributions[4] and presentations and exhibits in various countries. TWAN events have been organized in countries such as United States, Brazil, Chile, France, Germany, Italy, Turkey, Algeria, Iran, India, Thailand, South Korea, South Africa, and Australia.[5] The images are also presented in the form of publications[6] and TWAN books and DVDs are planned for release in 2010.
Management
About 30 night sky photographers[7] from around the world combine their talents and expertise through TWAN. They travel globally and photograph scenes that tell how the familiar sky appears the same from country to country and continent to continent.
The TWAN project is coordinated by Astronomers Without Borders (AWB). According to its website, "TWAN has brought together photographers, astronomers and organizations worldwide to create a new international team that fulfills its primary goal of bringing to the public a new way of seeing the beauty of nights sky and wonders of our planet, portraying Earth’s people as one family and our world as a living planet we must care for."[8]
In addition to the main photo and video galleries on the TWAN website, there are specific galleries for UNESCOWorld Heritage Sites, and images that have appeared on NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) website. TWAN also has a "Guest Gallery" where people can submit their own night-sky images. This furthers the reach and variety of the image collection, which includes more than 1500 photos, videos, and VR imagery. Sites from about 50 countries are represented, spanning every continent.
The photographic imagery on the TWAN website is copyrighted.[9]
A TWAN photo displays a moonlit winter night in Alborz Mountains of Iran.
Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) is a website provided by NASA and Michigan Technological University (MTU). It reads: "Each day a different image or photograph of our universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer." The photograph does not necessarily correspond to a celestial event on the exact day that it is displayed, and images are sometimes repeated. These often relate to current events in astronomy and space exploration. The text has several hyperlinks to more pictures and websites for more information. The images are either visible spectrum photographs, images taken at non-visible wavelengths and displayed in false color, video footage, animations, artist's conceptions, or micrographs that relate to space or cosmology.
The Lagoon Nebula is a giant interstellar cloud in the constellation Sagittarius. It is classified as an emission nebula and has an H II region.
The International Year of Astronomy (IYA2009) was a year-long celebration of astronomy that took place in 2009 to coincide with the 400th anniversary of the first recorded astronomical observations with a telescope by Galileo Galilei and the publication of Johannes Kepler's Astronomia nova in the 17th century. The Year was declared by the 62nd General Assembly of the United Nations. A global scheme, laid out by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), was also endorsed by UNESCO, the UN body responsible for educational, scientific, and cultural matters.
Dennis L. Mammana is an astronomy writer, lecturer, and sky photographer. His newspaper column about astronomy, "Stargazers", has been syndicated since 1992, and he has led many expeditions across six continents on photography and public eclipse and aurora viewing trips.
The WestRock Observatory is operated by Columbus State University's Coca-Cola Space Science Center at 701 Front Avenue, Columbus, Georgia. Established in 1996, the observatory has active night sky and solar study programs for students and the general public. The equipment can be controlled and monitored remotely by faculty and astronomers. The observatory also offers mobile astronomy programs such as "Astronomy Nights" at Callaway Gardens, F. D. Roosevelt State Park, and Providence Canyon State Park as well as education outreach to the surrounding Georgia/Alabama area.
The False Kiva is a human-made stone circle of unknown origin in a cave in a remote area of Canyonlands National Park, which is located in U.S. state of Utah. It was closed by Canyonlands National Park rangers in early August 2018, as a result of vandalism.
Babak Amin Tafreshi is an Iranian photographer, science journalist, and amateur astronomer. He is the creator and director of The World At Night (TWAN), an international program in which photographers from around the world capture images of night skies as seen above notable landmarks of the planet. He is also a member of the board of advisors of Astronomers Without Borders and a project coordinator for the International Year of Astronomy (IYA2009).
Peter B. Lawrence is a British amateur astronomer. Since 2004, he has been a presenter on the BBC's The Sky at Night. He makes high resolution images of the Sun, Moon and planets, and takes images of time-limited phenomena such as eclipses and the aurora.
Rogelio Bernal Andreo is a Spanish-American astrophotographer. He is known for his photographs of deep sky objects. His work has been recognized by NASA as a regular contributor to their Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) 80 times. Andreo's photography has been published in international magazines and periodicals, as well as television networks including the BBC, National Geographic, and the Discovery Channel series Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking.
The Day the Earth Smiled is a composite photograph taken by the NASA spacecraft Cassini on July 19, 2013. During an eclipse of the Sun, the spacecraft turned to image Saturn and most of its visible ring system, as well as Earth and the Moon as distant pale dots. The spacecraft had twice taken similar photographs in its previous nine years in orbit around the planet. The name also refers to the activities associated with the event, as well as to the photographic mosaic created from it.
Robert J. Nemiroff is an Astrophysicist and Professor of Physics at Michigan Technological University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1987 and his B.S. from Lehigh University in Engineering Physics in 1982. He is an active researcher with interests that include gamma-ray bursts, gravitational lensing, and cosmology, and is the cofounder and coeditor of Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD), the home page of which receives over a million hits a day, approximately 20% of nasa.gov traffic. He is married and has one daughter.
Tunç Tezel is a Turkish amateur astronomer, photographer and civil engineer. He is a member of The World at Night (TWAN), an international program in which photographers from around the world capture images of night skies as seen above notable landmarks of the planet. He is a member of Turkish Astronomical Society (TAD) since 2007.
Nightshade is a simulation and visualization software for teaching and exploring astronomy, Earth science, and related topics. Its focus is on use in digital planetarium systems or as an educational tool, with additional features to allow it to also be used on desktop or laptop computers. It operates on Linux, macOS and Windows.
Alexandros Maragos is a Asphalt Tinted Silverback filmmaker and photographer. He is known for his landscape photography, night photography and timelapse imagery. His astrophotography work has been recognized by NASA as Astronomy Picture of the Day.
Astronomy Photographer of the Year is an annual astronomy photography competition and exhibition that is organised by the Royal Observatory, Greenwich.
Astronomers Without Borders (AWB) is a U.S.-based organization founded by Mike Simmons, dedicated to spreading astronomy throughout the world and connecting people through this universal interest. Projects include crowdfunding in developed countries to sponsor the purchase of equipment and training for people in developing countries. The group's aim is to create "goodwill and understanding" across all boundaries through the sharing of astronomy.
Petr Horálek is a Czech astrophotographer, popularizer of astronomy and an artist.
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Thomas Ashcraft is an American astronomer, naturalist, scientific instrument-maker, and artist. He is known for his observations of transient luminous events, meteoric fireballs, solar radio and optical phenomena, and Jupiter radio emissions.
Dylan O'Donnell is an Australian IT entrepreneur and amateur photographer, whose astrophotography has been featured by the European Space Agency (ESA), and NASA. His work has been selected twice for NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD).
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