Astrophotography demands patience, precision, and gear that can handle the extremes. I quickly realized that low-light conditions weren’t forgiving—unless you had the right tools. Enter Sony. 

Light pollution can wash out stars, so we seek out Bortle class 1 skies—the darkest possible conditions on Earth—for the clearest view of celestial objects. I'm fortunate to live just two hours from some of the world’s best stargazing locations along the Icefields Parkway in Banff National Park, where pristine Bortle 1 skies allow me to capture the Milky Way, aurora borealis, and distant galaxies in stunning clarity. These conditions, paired with the right gear, help bring out the very best in my astrophotography.

The Sony Alpha 7 IV’s high ISO performance allows for cleaner, low-noise images in dark conditions—crucial for capturing the faint details of the night sky. Its 33MP full-frame sensor delivers high resolution, enabling astrophotographers to crop images without losing detail and produce large, gallery-quality prints that showcase the intricate beauty of stars  and landscapes. Bright Monitoring is a feature on Sony cameras designed to enhance visibility in extremely low-light conditions, making it especially valuable for astrophotography. When programmed into one of the custom buttons and activated, bright monitoring temporarily boosts the screen brightness and gain, allowing photographers to better see stars, the Milky Way, or dark foreground elements in real time—without affecting the final image exposure. This makes it much easier to compose shots in the dark and fine-tune framing before taking a long exposure. As astrophotographers working in remote, pitch-black environments, bright monitoring is a game-changing tool that simplifies setup and ensures accurate composition when capturing the night sky.

Focus peaking is a powerful manual focusing aid available on Sony cameras that highlights the edges of objects that are in sharp focus, using a colored overlay (red, yellow, blue or white) on the live view screen. For astrophotography, where achieving precise focus on distant stars is critical—and often done in the dark—focus peaking becomes especially useful. By manually adjusting the focus ring and watching for the peaking highlights to appear on stars or foreground elements, astrophotographers can ensure their images are tack sharp. This feature helps save time in the field and reduces guesswork, especially when autofocus is unreliable in low-light conditions.

The advanced autofocus system in the Sony A7 IV, featuring Real-Time Eye AF and Real-Time Tracking, ensures fast and precise focus on animals—even in motion. These features are especially valuable during wildlife encounters, allowing photographers to lock onto a subject’s eye or body and maintain sharp focus for tack-sharp images. Combined with in-body image stabilization, the camera helps reduce blur from hand movement, making it easier to capture crisp, steady shots even with long lenses or in low-light, handheld conditions.

But it wasn’t just about specs. It’s an established trust in Sony cameras that gives me the confidence to take on any challenges that the cosmos throws at me. Whether I am hiking endless hours across the Icefields Parkway or chasing unpredictable solar storms through Alberta’s backroads, I know my gear will always keep up. From the blazing core of the Milky Way to the ghostly curtain of northern lights, Sony helps me capture what the human eye cannot see at nite. 

Today, my work is not just about images—it’s about storytelling. Sharing the science, the culture, and the wonder of the night sky. And every one of those stories started with a quiet night, a tripod, and a Sony camera pointed at the stars.