Joe O'Connor Posted March 19, 2013 Report Share Posted March 19, 2013 (edited) Has anyone done much in the ways of Astrophotography? I've been really keen on it and I had a small play last night on the road but was getting crazy colors due to light pollution. I am using a Canon 600D with a 18-200mm f/3.5 Tamron lens and I have, but did not use last night, a speedlight flash doodad. What color temperature should I be using? Last night I was getting red clouds and green street lamps and crap like that and it looked alright but I'd rather not have it. Faster shutter speed and higher ISO or slower shutter speed and lower ISO? My internet research suggests avoiding longer than 30 second shutter to avoid star movement What focal distance should I be aiming for? Best time of night? Hope fully you guys can give me some pointers. I'll be sure to post results afterward EDIT. Also, I'm looking into getting a fisheye lens. Don't want to spend a fortune on one. 8mm seems to be the best looking. Any ideas/experiences? Edited March 19, 2013 by Joe O'Connor Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Deere Posted March 19, 2013 Report Share Posted March 19, 2013 (edited) The most important consideration with astrophotography is location. To expose the least bright stars in the night sky you'll want to be somewhere as dark as possible, away from light sources and away from light pollution that can overpower the stars. It's surprising just how present light pollution can be even when you're tens of miles from the nearest major civilisation, but there are dark sky maps available online that can help you find good places to shoot from. You definitely don't want to be anywhere near streetlights. Next up is timing. Now you've found a spot to shoot from, you'll need to check weather and lunar cycles to make sure you get a good clear night with no cloud and if possible no moon... Even if it's not the new moon phase of the cycle, you can still get out after dark but before moon-rise depending on time of year. With that all set, camera settings are the simplest part of the equation. Basically you want to be exposing the least bright stars so you'll need to be gathering a LOT of light... Plus you don't want the exposure too long otherwise those stars won't cumulatively expose on a single point of the sensor and so will just motion-blur into obscurity. For that reason I always use a high ISO, wide aperture and a shutter speed never longer than about 10-15 seconds. ISO6400, f/2.8 and 15secs seems to be a good starting point... You can work it from there. Don't worry about white balance, I normally use quite a cool one so I get a good idea of what I'm working with even when reviewing in camera, but if you're shooting RAW you have absolute control in post processing so shouldn't need to worry too much. Here's an example from a dark forest, relatively clear night but could have been better. ISO6400 f/2.8 15s You'll know you've found a good spot to shoot from when you can't see your hand in front of your face Hope that helps. Edited March 19, 2013 by Mike Deere 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe O'Connor Posted March 19, 2013 Report Share Posted March 19, 2013 Thanks heaps dude! That photo looks so amazing! I live in a town of 4000 to 6000 and there is a place i have in mind about 7km out of town that I really want to try. I can reach 6400ISO but my lens doesnt go down to f/2.8, the best I can do is f/3.4. Which really doesn't mean a huge amount other than running at about 20-25 seconds? I always shoot RAW for the very reason, makes editing that much easier. What editing software do you recommend I may as well ask? I "purchased" PS Elements and it seems to be doing alright for me so far. The other thing... I had a bit of a look but I couldn't really find a decent map/graph/list/whatever of what star formations and stuff are around at what time of the month... Any help there? But thanks heaps man, really helpful Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Deere Posted March 19, 2013 Report Share Posted March 19, 2013 It's a bit of an obscure site, but about half way down the page there's a really good tool for finding locations with minimal light pollution: http://www.need-less.org.uk/ This is a pretty decent visual reference for constellations. http://www.astronomy.co.uk/skymap Even if you're shooting at f/3.4 you'd probably be better off keeping the exposure to 10-15 seconds and then just pushing it a little in post processing, the time can really make a difference to the clarity of the stars as it's actually quite surprising how quickly you pick up motion blur from the rotation of Earth. PS Elements is fine, from what I remember it can do most of the stuff you need such as curves so it should be ok. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Quinn Posted March 19, 2013 Report Share Posted March 19, 2013 Anyone wanna swap their SD cards for my CF cards? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Deere Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Won my category in the Professional Photographer of The Year 2012 awards http://mikedeere.com/winner-of-the-50mm-category-professional-photographer-of-the-year-awards-2012/ 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadManMike Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Nice one man, incredible achievement and an incredible photo! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Congratulations, that is an amazing achievement! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LukasMcNeal Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 That's an awesome photo! Roughly how much post production goes into a photo like that? Just curious Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King C Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Congratulations on the award. I was also wondering about post production as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Deere Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Thanks folks There wasn't a great deal of post production involved... It mostly involved tidying up the colour balance and exposure. No more than about 10 mins in Lightroom involved. Due to the nature of the scene, consisting of extremely bright lights and vast swathes of darkness, there was a little clawing back of the highlights and pushing the shadows a bit to bring back some of the detail that wasn't visible without that extra latitude of the raw file. But it was kept under control so as not to flatten the image and ruin the contrast. Oh also again due to the bright lights (and wide aperture) there was a fair bit of chromatic abberation around the highlights on the back right of the photo, but Lightroom made removing it a painless task. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LukasMcNeal Posted March 30, 2013 Report Share Posted March 30, 2013 Ahh cool cheers! And well done Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted March 31, 2013 Report Share Posted March 31, 2013 Recently I have been trying my hand at some bird photography, and despite the many days which have yielded absolutely no images whatsoever, I have managed to capture a few decent ones, namely these two: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Aston Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 have you taken the background out of the top image? nice sharp images though, what lens where you using? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 have you taken the background out of the top image? nice sharp images though, what lens where you using? Thanks dude! In the top photo, I used a flashgun mounted camera right about 1 foot above the camera to act as a key, and just cancelled out most of the ambient light by working at 1/250, f/11. The shot was taken at sunset, so there wasn't a huge amount of light hitting the background, plus I shot into the sun which also gave me the warm rim light that you can see at the right side of the feeder and on the bird's tail Both shots were with my Tamron 70-300 VC lens, both at 300mm, and both through a double-glazed glass window Here is another one I took this morning, moved the camera even closer (focus distance was about 1.8m) which gave me this, cropped ever so slightly: 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
max-t Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 Good stuff Lewis, keep it up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Aston Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 Thanks matey. Very nice shots. Iv done most of my bird photography through double glazed windows so I know it's not easiest thing in the world. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 Good stuff Lewis, keep it up! Thanks very much, really appreciate it Thanks matey. Very nice shots. Iv done most of my bird photography through double glazed windows so I know it's not easiest thing in the world. Yeah, I have really come to appreciate bird photography, once you do that sort of thing it really does give you an insight into how much of a challenge it is. I have found that it can also become very tedious, and although it can be easy to capture a photo of a bird, getting one that is decent is a serious challenge (like worrying about balancing the focus/D.O.F, exposure compromises, thinking about what sort of background you want, setting up the shot in the right place to attract the most birds possible etc.). Anyway you guys know what it's about Thanks again guys! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Booth Posted April 1, 2013 Report Share Posted April 1, 2013 They're cracking pictures. A friend of mine that used to ome into work was a wildlife photographer and took trips around te UK with Simon king. Some of the stories he had of waiting for a specific bird to land on a specific branch/feature was unreal. His name was Paul but I can't remember his last name, the bbc used a lot of his shots.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrEvil270183 Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 Some pre-wedding action from Yorkshire. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stoozie Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 Nothing special from me, just a few photos from the weekend. I need to stop shooting fish eye all the time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 Nothing special from me, just a few photos from the weekend. I need to stop shooting fish eye all the time. I reckon those would look much better in monochrome, to really draw attention to the shapes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jake. Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 Some amazing photographers on this forum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Gething Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 The last bird photograph I will upload, really happy with the results here: 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jake. Posted April 8, 2013 Report Share Posted April 8, 2013 So good you'd think it's fake. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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