Entrants in the second contest submitted a variety of stunning images, from night sky landscapes to deep sky objects.
The Milky Way is reflected in Suthat Tso Lake at the Pensi La Pass in the Zanskar Valley in the Ladakh region. This image won the 2023 Indian Astronomical Photographer of the Year competition in the night scene category. Credit: Soumya Banerjee
The 2023 edition of the Indian Astronomical Photographer of the Year competition has ended. The winners and shortlisted images were amazing.
The contest is sponsored by astronomer banglais a group of four astrophotographers who came together during the COVID-19 pandemic and have since hosted numerous workshops at dark sky sites across India. This year’s contest, in its second year, was judged by a panel of eminent astrophotographers including Ajay Talwar, Dorjee Anchuk and Vikas Chander. A total of 751 images were submitted by 142 participants.
The winning and shortlisted images will be announced in a livestream on December 24 and will be exhibited at the MP Birla Planetarium in Kolkata from December 31, 203 to January 7, 2024.
To learn more about the Astronomads Bangla group and India’s astronomical imaging community, read the article in the December issue written by the group’s co-founder Soumyadeep Mukherjee.
Scroll down to see all the winning and shortlisted images in each category.
deep sky
Winner — Devesh Pande — The Garlic Pop Nebula
Runner-up — Prabhas Delia — Eagle Nebula
Thumbs Up — Anil Kumar, Minnesota — Pleiades
Finalist — Abhinav Maroti Vitekar — Veil Nebula
Finalist — Aditya Kinjawadekar — Horse with a Fly
Finalist — Harshwardhan Pathak — NGC 7000
Finalist — Prabhakaran — Leo Triplett
Finalist — Shikhar Gupta — M81 and M82 Wide Field and Surrounding IFN
night view
Winner — Soumya Banerjee — Stat Tso
Runner-up — Tiruchitrambalam M — Starry Hanle Knight
Highly Regarded — Umesh Gonya — Celestial Symphony
Finalist — Himanshu Kasale — The arc of the Milky Way rises behind the Sahyadri Mountains.
Finalist — Kartik Kota — Milky Way and Lightning Sprite
Finalist — Naveen Sheraiah — Cosmic Butterfly
Finalist — Ruben — Chasing Stars
Finalist — Sneha Chatterjee — Milky Way of Merak
solar system
Winner — Sona Shahani Shukla — Eclipse on Jupiter
Runner-up — Nihal S Amin — Coronal Streamer
Highly Commended — Aditya Kinjawadekar — Dusty Mars
Finalist — Kunal Kishor Vaze — Mineral Moon
Finalist — Prabhakaran — Crater Plato and Surroundings
Finalist — Prakash Subbanna — Hydrogen Alpha Sun
Finalist — Sandeep Mathur — The Omen
Shortlist — Shivam Bansal — Moon Crossing
Best female astrophotographer
Winner — Vidya Vasudevan — Milky Way and Mighty Mountain
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Finalist — Sona Shahani Shukla — Pelican Nebula
Finalist — Vidya Vasudevan — Milky Way and Venus in Golden Hour
Best mobile astrophotographer
Winner — Aditya Kinjawadekar — Milky Way and the mighty Rajgad fort
Finalist — Karthik P — Selfie with Milky Way
Finalist — Subham Rath — “Under the Celestial Canopy Forest Roads” by Starlight
