If you would like to post, you'll need to register. Note that if you have a BCG store account, you'll need a new, separate account here (we keep the two sites separate for security purposes).

B

Bubbahotep

Well-known member
Member's gallery
Here are six images of the Milky Way. The last one is of the Cassiopeia region of the Milky Way. Also, the tiny glowing ellipse in that image is the Andromeda Galaxy.

Getting these photos have wrecked my sleep patterns for the time being. I look forward to returning to a normal life and bedtime.


jpeg1 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.



jpeg2 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.



jpeg3 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.



jpeg4 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.



jpeg5 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.



jpeg6 small.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.
 
Last edited:
Member's gallery
Beautiful images! I am struck by the locations you selected which resulted in strong compositions, particularly in images #1-4. Would #2 have benefitted from a small aperture?
 
Member's gallery
Bob k. said:
Great images! Thanks for posting them. Can you tell us a little about how you captured them?
Click to expand...
Thanks for asking!

These photos are composites. The landscape portions are typically shot at dusk and are focus stacked. While the landscapes can be shot at night (a moonlit one is favored by many astrophotographers) or at dusk, I find shooting at night more difficult because it's hard to get sharp focus and the moonlight creates a bright spot light in the water. As you can see from the Milky Way photos I posted here the images have a lot of water in them. Over land, using the moon light would make more sense although the light is directional and thus casts a shadow.

Most of the Milky Way portions are stacks of 5-10 8 second exposures taken from roughly the same place. The third photo is a stack of 2 minute tracked photos.
 
Member's gallery
Butlerkid said:
Beautiful images! I am struck by the locations you selected which resulted in strong compositions, particularly in images #1-4. Would #2 have benefitted from a small aperture?
Click to expand...
Thanks for your kind comments!

Yes, I think #2 would have benefited from a smaller aperture. I will have to reshoot that photo.
 
Member's gallery
Just for the record should someone want to try Milky Way photography. When I said my photos are composites, I mean to say that they are more like focus stacks. So, the photos I posted here show events that occur in nature. These are not the kinds of composites (or ridiculous juxtapositions, depending on your view) where I might combine a Milky Way image with the fountain light show at the Las Vegas Bellagio hotel.
 
Last edited:
Member's gallery
I re-edited this one removing some of the stars to highlight the nebulosity of the Cassiopeia region of the Milky Way. I'm speculating but that splotch about two inches down and slightly to the right of Andromeda might be Triangulum, another nearby galaxy.

jpeg merged-stackall-DeNoiseAI-standard-affinity v 2.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.
 
Member's gallery
This one was really tough to process due to haloing. I'll probably come back to it a year from now and re-process it when my skills get better.

jpeg output stack last 5 affinity.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.
 
Member's gallery
NorthernFocus said:
These are really excellent. I have just enough of an idea what it takes to get them to know that it's more than I'm willing to do. But I'll sure enjoy looking at yours. Well done.
Click to expand...
You might want to give it a try. The hard part is composing and processing. My hope is that this type of photography will make me a better landscape photographer. For context, I consider myself to be a bird photographer.

BTW, if you think Milky Way landscape photography is hard, try deep sky astrophotography. That will drive you nuts. I've done it and will keep on doing it. My problem is that because the weather is often cloudy where I live, I don't get enough opportunities to get better. In fact, when I compare myself to others who started roughly at the same time, I see that they're doing all kinds of things I can't even think about. I don't even know if I can do what I did a few years ago. Scary. The other thing is that while deep sky astrophotography is beautiful, I find the images kind of anonymous. I think it is inherently a difficult medium for the photographer to display his/her personality.

Anyway, if you're curious, this is kind of a fun astrophoto featuring the California Nebula (red) and the Pleiades star cluster on the right (blue). Some people try to gather a lot of nebulosity on this image but I decided that that nebulosity would detract from the two main subjects. I'm aware that I just contradicted what I said in the last paragraph, but if you look at images of, let's say, the North America nebula, they all look the same assuming the photographers used the same color and framing.

jpeg process w spikes-DeNoiseAI-clear-lines-scale-2_00x-gigapixel.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.
 
Last edited:
Member's gallery
Bubbahotep said:
You might want to give it a try. The hard part is composing and processing. My hope is that this type of photography will make me a better landscape photographer. For context, I consider myself to be a bird photographer.

BTW, if you think Milky Way landscape photography is hard, try deep sky astrophotography. That will drive you nuts. I've done it and will keep on doing it. My problem is that because the weather is often cloudy where I live, I don't get enough opportunities to get better. In fact, when I compare myself to others who started roughly at the same time, I see that they're doing all kinds of things I can't even think about. I don't even know if I can do what I did a few years ago. Scary. The other thing is that while deep sky astrophotography is beautiful, I find the images kind of anonymous. I think it is inherently a difficult medium for the photographer to display his/her personality.

Anyway, if you're curious, this is kind of a fun astrophoto featuring the California Nebula (red) and the Pleiades star cluster on the right (blue). Some people try to gather a lot of nebulosity on this image but I decided that that nebulosity would detract from the two main subjects. I'm aware that I just contradicted what I said in the last paragraph, but if you look at images of, let's say, the North America nebula, they all look the same assuming the photographers used the same color and framing.

View attachment 45343
Click to expand...
Wow. This is so cool. I've lived in Alaska for 22 years 9 of which were in Fairbanks with long winter nights and crystal clear skies. Have never even taken one shot of the Aurora. That sums up my level of motivation. No, I'm all about fur and feathers. Once in a while other stuff gets in the way...
 
Member's gallery
NorthernFocus said:
Wow. This is so cool. I've lived in Alaska for 22 years 9 of which were in Fairbanks with long winter nights and crystal clear skies. Have never even taken one shot of the Aurora. That sums up my level of motivation. No, I'm all about fur and feathers. Once in a while other stuff gets in the way...
Click to expand...
Here's another one you may enjoy. This type of image is the undemanding stuff (all you need is a star tracker and an astromodified camera) but the details and nebulosity are so rewarding and cool. This is of the Cygnus region of the Milky Way.

jpeg processed stacked 0416 and 0418-DeNoiseAI-denoise.jpg
You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.