Colors of the Moon

Explanation: What color is the Moon? It depends on the night. Outside of the Earth's atmosphere, the dark Moon, which shines by reflected sunlight, appears a magnificently brown-tinged gray. Viewed from inside the Earth's atmosphere, though, the moon can appear quite different. The featured image highlights a collection of apparent colors of the full moon documented by one astrophotographer over 10 years from different locations across Italy. A red or yellow colored moon usually indicates a moon seen near the horizon. There, some of the blue light has been scattered away by a long path through the Earth's atmosphere, sometimes laden with fine dust. A blue-colored moon is more rare and can indicate a moon seen through an atmosphere carrying larger dust particles. What created the purple moon is unclear -- it may be a combination of several effects. The last image captures the total lunar eclipse of 2018 July -- where the moon, in Earth's shadow, appeared a faint red -- due to light refracted through air around the Earth. Today there is not only another full moon but a total lunar eclipse visible to observers in North and South America -- an occurrence that may lead to some unexpected lunar colorings.

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Real castles are not this old. The background galaxy is older. The rock spires are millions of years old and look a bit like an alien castle. Hoodoos are rare and occur when dense rocks slow the erosion of softer rock underneath. The hoodoos in the French Alps are called "demoiselles Coiff", which means " Ladies with Hairdos" in English. The central disk of our own Milky Way galaxy contains stars that are billions of years old. Behind the hoodoos, you can see the Cygnus sky region, which is rich in dusty dark clouds and red glowing nebulas. The foreground was captured during the evening blue hour while the background was taken later that night.