First star trails

[Big]

I gave it a shot last week over my vacation in Maine and I came up with this. I feel the focus is a little off. I set it to infinite. I don't think some people realize how hard it is to compose a shot in complete darkness! I thought it was kinda neat to see the satellite trails in the shot.
C&C welcome!
Thanks! -BIG

The exif is
3454 seconds (just short of an hour)
ISO 100
f/4

 

[Josh66]

Cool. You actually left your camera on, exposing, for almost an hour?

I've always been scared to do that on a digital camera...lol. I think the longest I've ever done (digitally) was 15 minutes.


Focus does look a little off... Maybe it needed to be just short of infinity...?

 

[Big]

Cool. You actually left your camera on, exposing, for almost an hour?

I've always been scared to do that on a digital camera...lol. I think the longest I've ever done (digitally) was 15 minutes.


Focus does look a little off... Maybe it needed to be just short of infinity...?

Yup, it was just below freezing out so I wasn't too worried about the sensor overheating (I bet I'll get crap for saying that).

 

[astrostu]

Yep, focus is off. Does the 50D have "live view?" I didn't think I would use it at all after years with my Rebel with just looking through the finder, but for astrophotography and focusing, the live view feature and super-high ISO on my 7D literally saves about 10-30 minutes of focusing hell. Remember that infinity on the lens is not where infinity will actually be. Very minute rotations (by a degree or so) will completely change the focus for star trails.

 

[plastii]

Pretty cool.

 

[TJ K]

Ya the focus is off a little. What I usually do is put up the ISO a bit and then do a semi quick exposure and check if it's all in focus and if it is then I lower the iso and do my shot. I really like the composition of the shot though, just keep working on it.
TJ