Photographer: Peter Lowenstein

Summary Author: Peter Lowenstein



Through much of June, Zimbabwe continued to have vivid sunsets caused by the April 22, 2015, eruption of Calbuco Volcano in Chile. Volcanic aerosols, primarily ash and dust, effectively scatter sunlight, reddening sunsets and sunrises. A particularly beautiful sunset occurred on May 10 that included dynamic kaleidoscopic patterns of color from shifting crepuscular rays and reflection of sunlight from both diffuse patches of aerosols high in the sky and a thin broken layer of low clouds moving in from the west. Click here to see a video of this sunset. This spectacle was captured from the verandah of my house in Mutare, Zimbabwe.



Photo Details: Sunset captured in a time-lapse sequence of 50 photographs taken at about 20-second intervals using a tripod-mounted Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ60 compact camera in sunset auto mode with wide angle lens. This sequence was used to produce a looped flash (swf) movie that was then converted to a high definition MP4 video (time-lapse looped 10 times) suitable for presentation on YouTube.