Babak Tafreshi
Babak Tafreshi is an award-winning photographer working with the National Geographic, a master of night-time photography and nightscape videos. He used the context of the night sky to bridge Earth and sky, art and science, cultures and time. He is also a science journalist and the founder of The World at Night (TWAN) program; an elite group of about 40 photographers in 25 countries who present images to reconnect people with importance and beauties of the night sky and natural nights (since 2007).
Born in 1978 in Tehran he is based in Boston, United States, but could be anywhere on the planet, chasing stories from the Sahara to the Himalayas or Antarctica. He is also a contributor to Sky&Telescope magazine, the European Southern Observatory (ESO), and a board member of Astronomers Without Borders organization, an international organization to bridge between cultures and connect people around the world through their common interest to astronomy. He received the 2009 Lennart Nilsson Award, the world’s most recognized award for scientific photography, for his global contribution to night sky photography.
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- Magnificent aurora display during our Sep 2017 tour, photographed from a lava area in the northern Iceland.
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- A magnificent aurora storm during our March 2018 program, over a glacier in southern Iceland.
As a science journalist, he has contributed to many television and radio programs on astronomy and space exploration especially when living in Iran. He was the editor of the Persian astronomy magazine (Nojum) for a decade and been involved with various science education and outreach programs.
Babak started photography of the night sky above natural landscapes and historic architecture in the early 1990s when he was a teenager. He has always been fascinated by the universality of the night sky; the same sky appearing above different landmarks of the world. Photography, science stories and eclipse chasing have taken him to the 7 continents.
www.babaktafreshi.com
