If you were to ask me to go out at midnight in the middle of December and look for meteors, I would say “No way, I’m watching a Very Brady Christmas. Get out of here.”

However, in the evening around December 14, while many of us were warmly tucked away in our cat capes, an annual celestial event took place above.

One brave photographer spent a chilly night in a Nagano park to capture these meteors for us all to see.

This meteor shower consists of Geminids, which are meteors that appear to originate from the constellation Gemini.  In fact, they come from an asteroid called 3200 Phaethon.

The video was taken on the ski slopes of Sugidaira in Nagano Prefecture and is actually a series of 2000 photographs taken with a 15 second exposure time.  The result is that arc-like path of the Geminids which move more slowly that other meteors.

The video takes place between midnight and dawn on the morning of December 14.  These meteors are believed to peak at around two or three o’clock in the morning on this day every year.

Watching the “painting” of meteors that develops over the sky in the middle of the video really puts where you sit on Earth in another perspective. Then watching the straight shots of the sky you can’t help but feel miniscule in the grand scheme of things.

So next time someone asks me to go out in the middle of December to look for shooting stars… I’d probably still say “no” since I got this video now. I mean, it’s freaking cold.  But the Geminids are gorgeous nonetheless.

Original Article: Yayoi Saginomiya on Pouch (Japanese)
Video: YouTube beaphoto1

[ Read in Japanese ]