The North Ronaldsay night sky competition developed out of the island’s dark skies – some of the finest in Britain – together with the island’s strong support for talks by visiting speakers in the annual Orkney International Science Festival.

The Scottish Government provides prizes through its support for science festival activities, and WHB Sutherland Ltd provides high-quality printing and mounting to enable for entries to be displayed in exhibition format.

Further support for the competition has come from the company’s managing director, Torquil Clyde, taking time to travel to North Ronaldsay to present the competition prizes. For the first competition he arrived on a night of wind and rain, but for the second presentation it was a September evening, with the opportunity to see the Andromeda Galaxy and the Ring Nebula through the island’s new community telescope.

The first winner was North Ronaldsay resident Marion Muir, with an image of the night sky behind the island’s standing stone, taken at 11 pm just before the longest day of the year. For the second competition, the top prize went to a visitor to the island, Mark McWilliams, with a photograph of the waxing crescent moon.

Entries are now open for the third competition, in which there are four categories:

(1) best night sky or night sky object
(2) best sunrise or sunset
(3) most original
(4) best entry from a primary school pupil