heavenly hanksville
astro + photography adventure workshop
The Milky Way arching over the rainbow bentonite hills- you can spot factory butte off on the horizon! We 4x4 you out here for sunset, then we return later to shoot astrophotography as we will have scouted out compositions earlier.
the heavens shine bright above hanksville
Hanksville, Utah is a remote town in Utah. High desert surrounded by vast expanses of incredible desert, Hanksville will be our home base as we explore the incredible geologic features and immensely dark night skies in the area.
April 15 - 19, 2026
Once in Hanksville, we tour you around to the local geologic wonders and best views teaching you the art of night photography! Droning and landscape photography are highly encouraged, as we will be out at many of these locations during the best light; golden hour, twilight, and of course night time during the New Moon cycle and Milky Way galactic core!
Hanksville is one of the best places in the Southwest to do astrophotography! It’s much less crowded than it’s sister city of Moab, has some of the darkest skies in the country, and has humble yet comfortable accommodations! For this workshop we are offering camping-first accommodations as the appeal is to be able to sleep right on the rims of canyons and have an easy, front row seat to all the best views! There are hotel options in Hanksville, and campers will basically always have access to bathrooms andshowers, so the camping is comfortable! The image below is one of our front row camping spots:
The Milky Way galactic core rising over Moonscape Overlook. These badlands are insanely expansive and impressive, and the Milky Way core will be stretching across the sky and expanses of wild badland geology. We get to camp right here on the rim to really immerse ourselves in the beauty and enjoy relaxed and beautiful night photography lessons and sessions under the stars here. It’s the best!
logistics
We start in Hanksville, Utah on Wednesday April 15th between 4-6pm
We finish in Hanksville, Utah on Sunday April 19th between 8-10am
The three best airport options are:
Salt Lake City, Utah - most flight and rental options, 3.5 hour scenic drive.
Grand Junction, Colorado - decent flight and rental options, 2.5 hour very scenic drive.
Moab, Utah - more expensive options but convenient and scenic drive, 1 hour 15 minutes.
Once in Hanksville, it’s easy for us to coordinate carpools and caravan out to shooting locations together! Our plan is to camp at several amazing spots together, if you choose hotels as your accommodations, you will need a rental car and have to commute a little, but everything is pretty close to each other!
lodging
There are camping and hotel options for this trip! The camping is really great as we have easy access to toilets, showers, and restaurants. There are easy and reasonable hotel options right in Hanksville that we can help you book.
Camping allows us the unique opportunity to have easy front row access to amazing canyon views and a very immersive astrophotography experience; camping allows us to have this workshop priced out well below industry standard with the option to book your own hotels in Hanksville, which are very reasonable.
For campers, we can provide all the camping gear including charging capabilities, starlink, water, and some meals and snacks while not near restaurants. Hotel goers will have to commute a bit to our shooting and camping locations, you are welcome to camp a bit and book hotels as you see fit.
difficulty and group size
This astrophotography is great for all level of astrophotographers and adventurers! This is an easy going, low effort but high reward astrophotography workshop with minimal hiking with your gear, but you will need to be comfortable to navigate uneven terrain at night with your camera gear in a group.
Our small group size, 6 students to 2 teachers (some workshops have 12 students and only 2 teachers and call that small… crazy!) allows us to tailor lessons individually and give lots of 1on1 hands on instruction under the stars to each participant.
what will you learn?
We teach you our full workflow, from planning a shot with locations and astronomy fundamentals, camera settings in dynamic environments, all the way to editing to maximizing the potential in your RAW photos!
We will cover astrophotography basics like focusing at night, optimal camera settings, composition, and light painting
We do several editing sessions throughout the trip (at a local restaurant!) and follow up the workshop with custom editing video tutorials.
We build upon fundamentals to more advanced techniques like panoramas, using a tracker, blue hour foregrounds, and image blending
We are going to put an emphasis on teaching you how to capture detailed and emotion evoking panoramic images of landscapes and the night sky! April is the best time of year to capture impressive panoramas of the full milky way arch, and the wild and expansive landscapes around Hanksville lend themselves to this endeavor!
We take pride in providing fun, safe, relaxed, and immersive astrophotography adventures! We strive to create unforgettable memories together as well amazing photos.
location highlights
Goblin Valley
Rainbow (Bentonite) Hills
Factory Butte
Moonscape Overlook
Badland Spires (Long Dong)
Leprechaun Canyon
workshop cost & payment terms
The tuition for this workshop is $2,800 total, hotels can be purchased separately. A non-refundable deposit of $750 or $1,000 with the “extra hotels” option is required to reserve your spot with the remaining balance due 60 days before the workshop starts. Alumni, please reach out for a discount as it depends on a few factors! Payment plan options are also available at check out.
Join us!
This workshop is limited to 6 participants in order to maintain the small group size and allow us to tailor our photography lessons to your specific needs. You are welcome to bring a non-photographer guest +1, there could be small permitting or camping fees applied. Friends signing up together, groups, and alumni please reach out for a discount!
itinerary
april 15th
Meet in Hanksville between 1-5pm! We will do a group dinner, then head out 30 minutes to our campsite with epic views!! We will be camping right where we are shooting sunset, twilight, then milky way, and sunrise! We will enjoy coffee and a light breakfast from our spot as well, head to shower and get a breakfast/lunch, and head off to our day time slot canyon shoot nearby!
We reserve our full itinerary for privacy! If you would like to see the full itinerary, packing list, or have any other questions, please reach out to us with the contact form below!
hanksville gallery
