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Unknown animal tracks combine with lines in the sand to provide a great foreground in this image captured under starry skies. I was hoping to find some great lines leading to the Milky Way and this scene with the animal tracks sure got my interest. The glow you see on the right side is light pollution coming from the little town of Alamosa, Colorado.

I described a few of the techniques I used in taking my last uploaded night scene from Sand Dunes. An interesting one I tried here was an attempt to "hand paint" the foreground. No, I'm not talking about post processing; I'm talking about light painting. When I shot earlier that night, I used my light diffuser to illuminate the foreground with a soft, gentle light. In this case, I was a bit lazy and tried just illuminating the palm of my hand with my little flashlight. Normally, this approach produces a light that's a bit too warm, but in this case, I thought the results looked great!

So there you have it, a hand painted night scape from Sand Dunes National Park, near Alamosa, Colorado.