Ventus: Halnaker Windmill Star Trails

December 15th, 2022, brought me to Halnaker Windmill on one of the windiest nights I've ever attempted star trail photography. The Latin title 'Ventus' means 'wind', and it was fitting—powerful gusts swept across Halnaker Hill, threatening to shake my tripod and ruin hours of exposures. But there was also poetic justice in photographing a windmill on a windy night, capturing a structure built to harness wind power beneath the wheeling stars.

Halnaker Windmill dates back to around 1750, sitting prominently atop Halnaker Hill near Goodwood in West Sussex at 650 feet above sea level. This distinctive brick tower mill lost its sails and cap in the 1905 storm, but its tower remains a landmark visible across the South Downs. The mill appears in countless paintings and photographs as an iconic Sussex structure. From this hilltop position, you can see across to Chichester and the coast on clear days.

The conditions that December night were challenging but clear. The wind was relentless—I had to weight my tripod with my camera bag and create a windbreak using my body to shield it from the worst gusts. But the upside of strong wind is crystal-clear air—all atmospheric haze gets blown away, creating perfect conditions for star photography once you solve the stability problem.

I used my Samyang 14mm ultra-wide lens at f/2.8, positioning the composition so Polaris would be centered above the windmill's tower. At ISO 640, I captured 390 frames of 25 seconds each over 169 minutes—nearly three hours fighting the wind on that exposed hilltop. Between sequences, I constantly checked that the wind hadn't shifted my tripod even slightly.

Stacking 390 exposures revealed these spectacular star trails wheeling around the North Star, perfectly centered above Halnaker Windmill. There's beautiful symbolism here—a windmill that once harnessed circular motion (rotating sails) to grind grain, now framed by the circular motion of stars created by Earth's rotation. Both are examples of humanity observing and documenting rotation, centuries apart.

Standing on that windswept hill for nearly three hours in the December cold, being buffeted by the same winds that once powered this mill's sails, created a profound connection. The wind that challenged my photography was the same wind that once turned these sails and ground wheat for Sussex communities 270 years ago.

When you look at this photograph, I want you to feel that wind—standing on Halnaker Hill on a December night, fighting gusts that once powered the windmill's sails, watching 169 minutes of Earth's rotation traced in star trails above the 1750 tower where circular motion of wind and stars converge on the West Sussex downs.