Shooting the stars

[wesrk]

I know next to nothing about photography but I've been looking at the stars for the past couple of weeks and I really want to start something like this, any tips?

ps. sorry to bring back this thread

 

[Scepticalscribe]

This is a wonderfully informative thread on an area that I have been interested in for some time. I have learned quite a bit just from reading it - thanks guys and gals.

Cheers and good luck

 

[JBmac]

This is a wonderfully informative thread on an area that I have been interested in for some time. I have learned quite a bit just from reading it - thanks guys and gals.

Cheers and good luck

I agree, I've been out 2 nights winging it, I read a little bit in the camera manual, but now I have some more things I can try. I am trying to get a shot of the International Space Station one night when it flys over my area. From the information I have it should go through the bottom half of the big dipper. I shot the big dipper, but I am still not satisfied with the picture. I will attach some practice night shots I took on those 2 outings, some of the sky and some of the field and the farm house, and one of a helicopter light trail. I used a nikon 50 mm f1.8 lens the first night, and a sigma 17-35mm f2.8 the second night.

 

[gkarris]

as you may or may not know i just got a Canon XTi, and i was interested in trying to photograph the stars, its been very clear here lately and i know its imposible with a regular digital camera, but is it possible with a DSLR? and how you go about it, other than get a tripod,i got that part covered

thanks!

I know next to nothing about photography but I've been looking at the stars for the past couple of weeks and I really want to start something like this, any tips?

ps. sorry to bring back this thread

Here's the Astronomy and Celestial Thread for a Canon User Forum:

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=136

The pics here usually have links to the photographer's site on how they got these awesome shots.

 

[ghettochris]

I have been working on shooting stars the last couple days.

I am using a cheap point and shoot, sony DSC-V1, manual mode, iso 200, 25 second exposures. I mounted it on an equatorial mount to freeze the sky to make the movie below out of 300 shots, 1 per minute.

Posted this in the pic of the day but this seems like a good place too.

http://gallery.me.com/ghettochris#100120
Direct DL of 46MB large version

here's a frame with labels:

The setup:

 

[wheezy]

Put it on a tripod, point it, and leave it open for a LONG time. You won't want to go any higher than ISO 100 if you're going for extra long exposures, you'll get your star trails.

Also, if you have In Camera Noise Reduction turned on, keep in mind that the camera will generally 'process' the picture for about as long as you had the shutter open - so make sure your batteries are totally charged.

If you want a circle affect, point your camera towards the north, you'll get shorter trails but will get circles. Point south and you'll get longer lines in shorter time.

1 Hr, 40 Mins, F 7.1, ISO 100 (Canon 20D)

 

[Chimpy]

Awesome thread - I have to try this. Although I live in NY in a fairly populous area, and I suspect light pollution might make it tough for really stark clear pictures of the stars.

 

[EricNau]

I recently had the chance to image under dark skies, and my favorite shot was that of the Lagoon Nebula (M8):

Taken with an Orion EON 80ED, Sirius Go-To mount, and Canon Digital Rebel XT. Four 120 second exposers, combined and digitally developed in Photoshop CS4.

 

[NeGRit0]

tonights attempt, went much better i think

http://www.adpictures.net/starsweb/stars

I concur.

 

[scotthayes]

...

Love the video...

 

[wesrk]

awesome shots and video. Loved it.

 

[DoNoHarm]

are there significant differences between the sensor technology used in various cannon/nikon/sony/etc camera bodies that come into play when taking shots like these? I mean is there one technology that gives better (lower) nose results all else being equal?

 

[flosseR]

Here's my (final version - "no longer too blue") of my night sky shot in Tanzania from last summer:

This was 30 seconds at ISO 1600 with a WA lens at 19mm (30mm equivalent) at f/3.5 (wide open), manual focus, in a Canon 20D dSLR.

For minimizing shake, I used the camera's options for flopping the mirror up early and then the (IIRC 30 second) shutter delay. If I recall how this worked, when I pressed the shutter release, it wobbled and made noise as the mirror flipped up, then several seconds later, it tripped open, then closed the shutter (minimal shake).

Post-processing, I increased the effective exposure by another +1 stop to brighten it up, plus added some sharpening and color balance work. Given that the 30 sec exposure used here was long enough to cause all the stars to streak, I don't think that I'd want to go with any longer exposure times (shorter would be better). Similarly, I didn't want to use ISO 1600, but I really wanted to pull up the very faint stars in the milky way to really get the desired impact.

FYI, I had also tried some "deep sky" shots with a telephoto, but the relatively long exposure times with the narrower viewing angle made the streaking of stars much more pronounced. You can check out an example at 100% pixels from a 70mm lens by clicking on this link.


I'd say that the main thing is to just go grab your tripod, figure out how to set the camera up with mirror lockup and delayed shutter release, then try some shots at different settings. Then, don't give up on them if they look a little "blah" at first glance...give them a little bit of post-processing too.


-hh

Ok I want to know how you got non streaking stars. usually, especially at 30 secs they are already streaked. Yours appear very nice, clear and lots of them.
This is a really good, one of the best ones i have seen, image and the amount of sky detail for 30 secs is amazing.

Now, I exposed 10 minutes and have nothing like that.. (I was going for trails but still, no nebula and believe me the sky was frigin clear and very cold at -20C )
I thought i did well but that one blows pretty much any night pic i have seen so far, especially on this forum, way out of the water..

 

[DoNoHarm]

Ok I want to know how you got non streaking stars. usually, especially at 30 secs they are already streaked. Yours appear very nice, clear and lots of them.
This is a really good, one of the best ones i have seen, image and the amount of sky detail for 30 secs is amazing.

Now, I exposed 10 minutes and have nothing like that.. (I was going for trails but still, no nebula and believe me the sky was frigin clear and very cold at -20C )
I thought i did well but that one blows pretty much any night pic i have seen so far, especially on this forum, way out of the water..

where in the cold, dark, north was that?

 

[flosseR]

where in the cold, dark, north was that?

Finland

 

[maddagascar]

soo can the sensor get messed up for leaving it open that long? like just for being open for a loooong period of time in BULB? i mean leaving it open for an hour for a star trail for one shot, is that bad?


amazing shots and will be getting my tripod very shortly, so i wanted to see if it was bad to do that.