Kuwaiti Photographer Wins Astronomy Photographer of the Year for 'The Quiet Predator'

On Thursday, September 17, 2026, the Royal Observatory Greenwich handed its top astrophotography prize to a man who drove a truckload of heavy equipment into the Kuwaiti desert to photograph a shark. Ali Alobaidly was named the overall winner of the 18th ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition, taking the prestigious title with an image that turns a patch of interstellar nothingness into a recognizable marine predator. The announcement marks the culmination of a global contest that drew thousands of entries from more than sixty countries, all vying to capture the most compelling views of the cosmos from the surface of the Earth.[2][3][4]

The winning photograph, titled "The Quiet Predator," captures the Shark Nebula, formally cataloged as LDN 1235. Located roughly 650 light-years from Earth in the northern constellation of Cepheus, it is not a glowing ball of superheated gas but rather a dark nebula. This means it is essentially a massive cloud of interstellar dust that is so incredibly dense it completely blocks the light of the stars situated behind it. Instead of emitting light, the structure reveals itself only by obscuring the brilliant stellar background.[1][2][4]

The result is a striking silhouette that looks remarkably like a great white shark drifting silently through a cosmic ocean. The edges of the dark dust cloud are illuminated only by the faint, blue-tinted glow of nearby reflection nebulae, which scatter the starlight and give the scene an ethereal, underwater quality. As Alobaidly noted when discussing the image, unlike its earthly cousins, this particular shark does not bite, but it does require an absurd amount of patience and technical precision to catch on camera.[1][4][5]

To pull the faint, ghostly shape out of the darkness, Alobaidly spent 28.5 hours integrating exposures over two consecutive nights in August 2025. He hauled his Askar 140 APO telescope, a heavy-duty tracking mount, and a specialized monochrome camera into the Al Salmy Desert in Kuwait's Jahra Governorate. He specifically sought out this remote location because it offered the only genuinely dark skies left in his country, far away from the overwhelming light pollution of the capital city.[1][2][4]

The flawless technical execution is what ultimately separated the image from the rest of the highly competitive pack. Steve Marsh, a competition judge and art editor at BBC Sky at Night Magazine, praised the image's "flawless presentation, pin-sharp details and dynamic contrast of light and dark." Marsh pointed out that the image is resolved so clearly that entirely separate, distant galaxies can be seen shining straight through the thinner patches of the shark's dusty body, a feat that places the photograph at the forefront of modern astrophotography.[3][4][5]

Alobaidly, who took home a £10,000 (roughly $13,300) prize for his efforts, is the first Kuwaiti photographer to win the competition's overall title in its nearly two-decade history. He described the "juxtaposition of an oceanic predator prowling the skies above the Kuwaiti desert" as "deeply poetic." For the photographer, the award-winning image represents a perfect intersection of his profound love for the wider universe and his deep, enduring connection to the arid landscape of his ancestors, proving that world-class astronomical observation can still be conducted from the Middle East.[2][4][5]

The competition, which is run by the Royal Observatory Greenwich in association with astrophotography equipment maker ZWO, also highlighted the next generation of dedicated skywatchers. Fifteen-year-old Greek photographer Nikolaos Strimpoulis won the Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year award for his image "Mineral Moon." Strimpoulis submitted a highly saturated lunar portrait that beautifully reveals the titanium and iron deposits scattered across the lunar surface, contrasting the dark, ancient lava flows of the maria with the bright, rugged terrain of the highlands.[1][3][5]

The winning images, selected from a massive pool of global submissions, go on public display starting Friday, September 18, at the National Maritime Museum in London. For a scientific discipline that often feels entirely dominated by billion-dollar orbital space telescopes and massive international consortiums, the exhibition serves as a striking reminder of what can still be seen from the dirt. It proves that breathtaking discoveries are still accessible to anyone with a telescope, provided they are willing to stay up all night looking for them.[2][3][4]