NASA's image today turns a desert staircase into a road to the Milky Way.

Today's NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, Desert Stairway to Heaven, uses a real staircase sculpture in Chile's Atacama Desert as a foreground that seems to continue directly into the Milky Way. The wide-angle composite was captured in July 2025 and published today.

Look closely and you can identify more than the obvious galaxy band: the dark dust lane of our Milky Way, zodiacal light, colored airglow, the Small Magellanic Cloud, the Andes and distant town lights. It is a beautiful example of planning a photograph around both landscape geometry and astronomical timing.

Action: open the original image and study where the foreground ends and the sky begins. For your own photography, the transferable technique is to scout a strong leading line first, then return when the night sky aligns with it.