Young Chinese photographer takes crown as Astronomy Photographer of the Year

Dong Shuchang, a 23-year-old photographer from northwest China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, was crowned the overall winner as the Astronomy Photographer of the Year for his mesmerizing photograph “The Golden Ring”, which shows an annular solar eclipse, becoming the youngest winner of the top photography competition in astronomy.

“The Golden Ring”, the winning photograph for Astronomy Photographer of the Year as taken by Chinese photographer Dong Shuchang in Ali, southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region. (Photo courtesy of Dong Shuchang)

This masterpiece was captured in Ali, southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region last year.

Dong said he simply waited for the perfect moment to press the shutter. "This place has year-round sunny weather, but in front of the annular eclipse, I saw dark clouds all over the sky,” Dong recalled.

"We were waiting with anxious minds but we were lucky. Within a minute of the annular eclipse, the sunshine penetrated through the clouds and afterwards the Sun was sucked into the thick clouds. We were so lucky here!" Dong said.

"Our Sun can still be seen as a ring circling the Moon as it passes in front of the Sun, and mountains on the lunar surface can be seen hiding some of this light on the lower righthand portion of the image," judge Emily Drabek-Maunder said while commenting on the winning photograph.

Fellow judge Steve Marsh remarked that the image is "moody, serene, perfectly captured and expertly processed. You feel as if you could reach into the sky and place this onto your finger."

It was the second time for Dong to win a prize at the competition, which is organized annually by the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. He was the winner of the Best Newcomer award category in 2019 for his image “Sky and Ground, Stars and Sand” taken at a section of the Mu Us Desert, one of the four largest deserts in China, near Pingluo county in Ningxia.