clouds

Strange UFO-shaped clouds were spotted over the Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa volcanoes by space observatory workers in Hawaii last week.

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has captured images of sun rays shining through the clouds at sunset, the first time this type of light has ever been observed on the Red Planet.

An extremely strange cloud appeared in the skies above Turkey last week. Stunned onlookers grabbed their phones to record the phenomenon.

A Daily Cloud is an ongoing art project by illustrator Chris Judge whose creative approach fuses sketches and photography.

The thin atmosphere of Mars makes the appearance of clouds a rare sight, though they can form around the planet's equator in the coldest time of the year. Last year, NASA noticed that some clouds were forming earlier than expected, and were ready this year to document them when they formed again.

NASA's Curiosity rover has captured a series of photos showing what clouds look like as they float across the sky on Mars. The photos are the clearest images of clouds seen so far by Curiosity since the rover arrived on Mars 5 years ago.

Storm and wedding photographer Mike Olbinski of Phoenix, Arizona, is back again with another incredible time-lapse project that shows summer monsoon season covering landscapes with rain, lightning, and dust. The 8-minute video above is titled "Monsoon III."

The city of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is known for its impressive skyline, which features the world's tallest building. Every so often, the city will become blanketed with a thick layer of fog that opens the door to beautiful photos of skyscrapers rising above clouds.

Daniel Cheong is one photographer who's always on the lookout for this particular photo opportunity. Over the years, he has built up an impressive collection of shots showing skyscrapers poking through Dubai fog.

To get the perfect aerial drone shots of the Dom Tower of Utrecht, Dutch filmmakers Jelte Keur and Reinout van Schie had to wait a full 10 months for the perfect weather conditions to arrive. But once they did, the minute forty-five of footage they captured made it all worthwhile.

"Undulatus asperatus" is a cloud formation proposed in 2009 that roughly translates to "roughened or agitated waves." These dark and stormy clouds travel across the sky in ominous waves, but generally dissipate without an a storm forming.

Storm chaser Alex Schueth was recently in the right place at the right time with his DSLR, and managed to capture one of these formations in the mesmerizing time-lapse video seen above.

Clouds and the sky often play a major role in time-lapse productions, but YouTube user darwinfish105's latest creation puts them front, center, and all around you in stunning fashion.

Hovering somwhere between 205 and 255 miles above Earth is the International Space Station, currently housing six intrepid explorers that are hurtling through space at roughly 4.8 miles per second.

And one of those individuals is Alexander Gerst, a geophysicist who spends a great deal of his time on the ISS holding a camera and putting it to use taking pictures of our planet.

Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde's photos of clouds hanging mysteriously in indoor locations have earned him a good bit of popularity. Created by using a smoke machine, precise atmospheric conditions and dramatic lighting, his Nimbus photos juxtapose the indoor and outdoor worlds.

In the short documentary video above, Smilde sat down with Avant/Garde Diaries and discussed his work, lending us some perspective on why he creates these photos and where he finds inspiration.

Stacking long-exposure photos of stars leads to some pretty neat photos and time-lapse videos, but what happens if you use a similar technique for clouds? That's what photographer Matt Molloy does. His "photo stack" images of landscapes show clouds that look like smears and brush strokes across the sky.

Photographer Camille Seaman is well-known for her images of icebergs, but recently she turned her attention to another state of water: supercell storm clouds. She has been partnering with storm chasers and shooting amazing images of violent weather passing through the American Midwest. The series is titled The Big Cloud.

Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde creates indoor clouds using a smoke machine and uses dramatic lighting to make them look realistic. He calls the project Nimbus.

At first glance, some of Simon Davidson's photographs look like Harry Potter stills showing flying cars floating in the clouds. They're actually a glimpse into the burnout subculture that's growing in Australia. These are competitions in which drivers try to create as much smoke as they can by spinning their tires in place.

This video tutorial, courtesy of Jeff Farmer of XNCreative.com, is a testament to …

Back on July 1, 2009, artist Kelly DeLay began a personal project titled “ …

Before We Begin is a project by photographer Christopher Jonassen (whose frying pan photos we featured here) that consists of diptychs showing clouds and cloud watchers. The images capture peaceful "moments of reflection between thought and action."

Fine art photographer Mitch Dobrowner wanted to photograph storm systems, so he partnered up with Roger Hill -- regarded as one of the top storm-chasers in the world -- and was introduced to Tornado Alley. Dobrowner writes,

Words are inadequate to describe the experience of photographing this immense power and beauty. And the most exciting part is with each trip I really don’t know what to expect. But now I see these storms as living, breathing things. They are born when the conditions are right, they gain strength as they grow, they fight against their environment to stay alive, they change form as they age… and eventually they die. They take on so many different aspects, personalities and faces; I'm in awe watching them. These storms are amazing sights to witness.... and I’m just happy to be there—shot or no shot; it's watching Mother Nature at her finest. My only hope my images can do justice to these amazing phenomenona of nature.

His images certainly do them justice -- the stormy landscape photographs Dobrowner has made through these trips are jaw-dropping.