Help with night sky photos

[paigew]

I have had several attempts with photographing the night sky but usually when I upload them they are out of focus. I have tried focusing to infinity (did not work) and also zooming in and live view/manual focusing on the brightest star I can find. For some reason I am having issues getting the clear shots I am envisioning (maybe it's my eyesight ) ....what are your focus tips?? Also, what is your favorite way to edit night sky photos? Any c&c on my edits is welcome!

f2.8 iso 400-800 20 second exposure. 16-35L lens

attached some shots that I did get focused (live view + zooming in + manual focus)

1

2

3

4. my fave shot composition wise that I am so bummed I missed It could be that my son was rushing me along for this one but I feel like focusing is so hit or miss!

 

[Original katomi]

Nice images, I really like the 2nd with the comit or space sun in the lower right. I normall pick the bright star and use the viewfinder to focus

 

[photoflyer]

I use live view on the brightest star or better yet a planet.

I have heard another technique is to focus on a distant object during daylight, turn off the AF and tape the focus ring.

Also use shutter lockup or at least a 2 second delay.

If you go pixel peeping you will see some motion blur with long exposures even with a wide shot.

I now have a Celestron telescope on which I can piggyback the camera. I looking forward to seeing how the Attitude Azimuth mount takes out motion blur but I am told that even with that, 30 seconds is the limit.

 

[Original katomi]

I get motion blur as well,
1 if you have a camera strap on remove it, the strap flapping can cause shake
2 watch where you stand, move about. I did some with the tripod set on decking of course soon as I moved it moved the boards and camera
3 have a look at stacking software, star stacks is said to be good. Lots of pics stacked to make one
Have you thought about a remote trigger
4 I read once there was a filter that would counter the orange glow of street/city light pollution don’t know if it still exists
Hope this helps

 

[ronlane]

Paige, when I shoot night sky's I look for a light to focus on way in the distance and have used both manual and auto focus. I really like the the images but I have questions about the camera settings. Specifically that last one that you like. To me it looks as if you zoomed in, probably to about 35mm on this one, am I correct? If I may ask, you say that you are using ISO's from 400-800, why so low? The reason that I am asking is that the Milky Way tutorials that I have seen suggest going higher than that for ISO.

This should also help you with focusing as well.

 

[paigew]

I use live view on the brightest star or better yet a planet.

I have heard another technique is to focus on a distant object during daylight, turn off the AF and tape the focus ring.

Also use shutter lockup or at least a 2 second delay.

If you go pixel peeping you will see some motion blur with long exposures even with a wide shot.

I now have a Celestron telescope on which I can piggyback the camera. I looking forward to seeing how the Attitude Azimuth mount takes out motion blur but I am told that even with that, 30 seconds is the limit.

I tried focusing these on the bright blob/star frame right...what I think is a galaxy (Adromeda)? I'm totally jealous of your telescope!! I'll have to search for some of your images! Where do you typically share them?

I get motion blur as well,
1 if you have a camera strap on remove it, the strap flapping can cause shake
2 watch where you stand, move about. I did some with the tripod set on decking of course soon as I moved it moved the boards and camera
3 have a look at stacking software, star stacks is said to be good. Lots of pics stacked to make one
Have you thought about a remote trigger
4 I read once there was a filter that would counter the orange glow of street/city light pollution don’t know if it still exists
Hope this helps

Thank you! I did use a remote and tripod for these

Paige, when I shoot night sky's I look for a light to focus on way in the distance and have used both manual and auto focus. I really like the the images but I have questions about the camera settings. Specifically that last one that you like. To me it looks as if you zoomed in, probably to about 35mm on this one, am I correct? If I may ask, you say that you are using ISO's from 400-800, why so low? The reason that I am asking is that the Milky Way tutorials that I have seen suggest going higher than that for ISO.

This should also help you with focusing as well.

I'm going to try the auto focus into the distance and see what kind of results I get. Thank you! Otherwise I guess I'll have to get better at focusing manually through live view :LOL:

It is interesting how on the last image I posted it looks compressed, like I zoomed in...but I just checked and it is shot at 16mm! That one I did raise up the ISO to 1250. I shot the ISO at 400-800 on the others just because. I hadn't done too much research and I didn't know how much noise a high ISO would introduce into the photo since I lifted the shadows a bit. What are your prefered settings? Tonight is a new moon so hopefully it's clear enough to give it another go

 

[tirediron]

Remember too that a lot of lenses will focus past infinity, so if you just rack the lens out as far as it will go, your skies are going to be soft. Focus on a bright object, and then switch to MF and leave it.

 

[paigew]

Remember too that a lot of lenses will focus past infinity, so if you just rack the lens out as far as it will go, your skies are going to be soft. Focus on a bright object, and then switch to MF and leave it.

This is good advice!! So what exactly does focusing to infinity do if it leaves you with soft images? I tried focusing on infinity when we were camping in big bend and all my images were soft

 

[ronlane]

You can search Youtube for how to photograph the milkyway and there are a ton. Most that I have seen have said to shoot at ISO 3200 or even 6400.

 

[paigew]

You can search Youtube for how to photograph the milkyway and there are a ton. Most that I have seen have said to shoot at ISO 3200 or even 6400.

oh wow! that is higher than I imagined!! I'll do some research, thanks!

 

[tirediron]

This is good advice!! So what exactly does focusing to infinity do if it leaves you with soft images? I tried focusing on infinity when we were camping in big bend and all my images were soft

Infinity isn't always infinity. It's just a marking on the lens at which point almost everything past 'X' is in focus, but lenses are designed for the average user at average distances, so when you start trying to focus on something millions of miles away vice a few hundred feet, things change. Also, remember that as your subject gets farther away it takes less rotation of the lens to achieve critical focus. The difference between focus and out of focus on a celestial object is probably only a matter of a couple of arc-seconds or less. Add to this, that many lenses, especially cheaper ones have enough slop in the focusing helicoid that they can go past infinity and start focusing closer, even though you're still turning the focusing ring in the right direction.

There's also the consideration that it may not be your lens. Atmospheric interference and earth/subject movement contribute to softness as well. Best results will always be achieved on cold, clear days and higher altitudes. The best you can do is manually focus, disengage all AF and hope.

 

[paigew]

This is good advice!! So what exactly does focusing to infinity do if it leaves you with soft images? I tried focusing on infinity when we were camping in big bend and all my images were soft

Infinity isn't always infinity. It's just a marking on the lens at which point almost everything past 'X' is in focus, but lenses are designed for the average user at average distances, so when you start trying to focus on something millions of miles away vice a few hundred feet, things change. Also, remember that as your subject gets farther away it takes less rotation of the lens to achieve critical focus. The difference between focus and out of focus on a celestial object is probably only a matter of a couple of arc-seconds or less. Add to this, that many lenses, especially cheaper ones have enough slop in the focusing helicoid that they can go past infinity and start focusing closer, even though you're still turning the focusing ring in the right direction.

There's also the consideration that it may not be your lens. Atmospheric interference and earth/subject movement contribute to softness as well. Best results will always be achieved on cold, clear days and higher altitudes. The best you can do is manually focus, disengage all AF and hope.

Thank you!! This makes sense

 

[photoflyer]

I'll have to search for some of your images! Where do you typically share them?

It is so new that I have only had one outing. Living in Washington DC means light polution and at the lake cabin there is still summer humidity.

That said, this is the first image I took. I got it aligned and then told the drive to slew to M13. To the naked eye there was nothing but a 20 second exposure yielded this (I think this was the jpeg).

So nothing stunning but it got me excited about the possibilities. It may be winter before I get any descent viewing opportunities and it had not dawned on me to post them but if I get a critical mass of good images I will likely create a page for them on my website.

 

[paigew]

I'll have to search for some of your images! Where do you typically share them?

It is so new that I have only had one outing. Living in Washington DC means light polution and at the lake cabin there is still summer humidity.

That said, this is the first image I took. I got it aligned and then told the drive to slew to M13. To the naked eye there was nothing but a 20 second exposure yielded this (I think this was the jpeg).

So nothing stunning but it got me excited about the possibilities. It may be winter before I get any descent viewing opportunities and it had not dawned on me to post them but if I get a critical mass of good images I will likely create a page for them on my website.

View attachment 177402

Love it! Definitely post more when you take them!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[paigew]

sky photos round two!

This time I used my remote trigger, tripod (of course), 16-35L, markiii settings were 20 sec exposure, f2.8 iso 2000 on the last two, and 3200 on the first. There is some light pollution when shooting towards the first shot so I couldn't go as high ISO wise. I also had to do some color correcting on that shot from the light pollution. Which sucks b/c we are in a "dark sky rated" area!

So maybe this is as good as I can get here, from home, during the summer? What are your thoughts? Are you adding noise reduction to your star images??