Sunrise on Mona Kea

This photo was taken from shipboard at dawn on the eastern side of the Big Island of Hawaii on the morning of May 10. Mona Kea is the highest mountain on the Island. The sunrise was spectacular. The lighting is completely natural sunrise through the clouds to the mountaintop. To recapture the colors and the spirit of the moment, the photo was color enhanced and de-noised with a Topaz plug-in for Photoshop Lightroom 3 software.

View LARGE and you can see the Obseratories at the summit. IF YOU REALLY SQUINT you can see through the Keck dual telescopes and see a distant Galaxy with stars that were formed 13.5 BILLION YEARS AGO.