By Sofía Anich
Photos by Cristian Aguirre
On January 18, 2023, Chilean timelapse photographer, moon hunter and astronomy enthusiast Cristián Aguirre captured the precise moment when a large meteor illuminated Lake Pehoé in Torres del Paine National Park, Chilean Patagonia.
With patience and perseverance, Cristián spent a month in the same spot, trying to capture the changing lights and the different skies that can be seen on one of the faces of the famous mountains of Torres del Paine, when in just a split second, his camera captured this luminous phenomenon.
In this interview, he recounts the moment he realized what an incredible photograph he had captured, tells us about his experiences during the long periods of time he spends photographing natural phenomena and shares the skies that have had the greatest impact on him in his career.
Cristian seeks to capture the changes in light between day and night.When you were in Torres del Paine what were you looking to capture? What was the initial plan?
It was my dream to go to Torres del Paine to capture them in timelapse. To portray the different transitions of light between day and night, night and day; and to see the process of a month in changes of moons and milky way, dark nights, light nights.
So the idea was to make a very complete coverage of one of the faces of the towers of Torres del Paine. It was in the summer when I captured the meteor and my idea is to go to all four seasons of the year and after that make a big timelapse, a project with the best of the transitions of the four seasons in the park.
So that was the initial plan. To capture in timelapse the transitions of light, of the towers, of the skies, the clouds, the details, the movement of the water. The expansiveness of the place inspired me to do that. The meteorite I'm telling you about was captured with two cameras, because I was doing a timelapse of the same landscape with different millimetres, so I'm lucky to have it in two photos, one with a 14 mm lens and the other with a 24 mm lens.
"When I saw the photos it was an incredible moment, a euphoria, a pure joy, I was running all over the place, super grateful"
How did you feel when you realized that you had captured such a special moment?
The photograph of the fireball I came to develop after three months when my trip was over and I managed to get home and transfer the millions of terabytes and photographs to the computer. There I was able to sit down, look at the photo and develop it properly.
When I'm in the field I'm super into something else and I don't have time to develop much while I'm on the move. I'm so intent on living in the moment and not missing anything, that I leave the developing and editing for later. So when I saw the photograph it was an incredible moment, euphoric, happy, I was all over the place, just super grateful.
It was like a dream come true. You are in nature for so long and you spend hours, nights, months there, so I always believed that nature was going to give me an epic moment for the constancy, dedication and devotion of not skimping on physical, psychological or monetary effort, just for the fact of staying in nature in extreme conditions. Timelapse asks for that, it asks for time and there is nothing more beautiful than being in nature’s temple for days and days just to capture, contemplate and look for that great photo.
Cristian is always looking to discover eye-catching phenomena.Have you ever seen a fireball like this before?
I had seen one, but I had never been able to capture it with a camera, one so big and in such a nice frame. I have photos of some in Uyuni, Bolivia, and I also captured a meteoric trail on Cerro San Lorenzo and another gigantic trail on the Villarrica volcano.
I have a cell phone photo also with some very strange sky effects that I captured during the lunar eclipse of May 14, 2023, in Patagonia in the ice field with Cerro San Valentin behind. It's the best photo I've ever taken, but I took it with my cell phone, it's very rare.
How do you technically manage to shoot such a phenomenon?
It's a bit like giving yourself over to the landscape and capturing as many horizons as possible and being lucky that a fireball passes by. You're always waiting for meteors, everywhere you go you expect something strange to happen, a beautiful light, a lenticular light, something like that where the landscape moves, where there's dynamic light.
I personally spent a month capturing the skies of Torres del Paine every day. Technically you have to be in the place as much as you can and personally there is a moment that I like a lot, which is between day and night or between night and day. That in-between point that links the two lights. I love to capture that moment and that's what I was doing when this fireball reflected in the impressive Lake Pehoé passed by and live I felt a flash, but I didn't see it clearly, it's a hundredth of a second when a fireball passes by, which are high speed meteors.
Cloud photography. 
Cristian considers himself a moon hunter.Are you looking for a specific astronomical phenomenon that you would like to capture?
Yes, the truth is yes, I am a life-long hunter of moons, stars and phenomena related to eclipses. I have photographed quite a few eclipses, full moons and suns setting in different aesthetic locations, with intention.
So the more meteors and fireballs I capture, the better. Also meteor trails or just strange things in the sky, be it UFOs, space debris, satellites, etc. It's always nice to see how the sky moves and everything that happens at night while you sleep. I am very passionate about everything to do with the sky and space, I want to go and photograph the eclipse in Egypt, in Alaska, in various countries where it will happen in the next few years.
"It's always beautiful to see how the sky moves and everything that happens at night when one sleeps"
One of your specialities in nature photography is skies, which one is your favorite moment?
One was in Torres del Paine, some incredible lenticular clouds, on a night close to the meteorite photo. Another is a sky I saw in 2010 in Pucón, with the Villarrica volcano smoking, the whole sky red, it was really an incredible light that I had never seen before. And well, so many others. Also some cirrus clouds that I saw in Coyhaique, in Patagonia, which was the first time I saw cirrus clouds and it was crazy, impressive, it was like lava stuck in the sky.
I remember many wonderful night skies, like the total lunar eclipse on May 14 that I experienced in the Patagonian Ice Fields in Aysén with the San Valentín mountain behind. I think that was one of the most marvellous nights I have ever seen in my life, the sky was tinged red with the reflection of the moon, which was also red. And also a lunar eclipse that was over the Villarrica volcano, a photo that I went hunting for years of searching. I found a good spot, I walked the day before through the mountains and at dawn, with incredibly cold temperatures, the moon set behind the Villarrica volcano, a wonderful spectacle.
