Milky Way at Dinosaur Point

[TreeofLifeStairs]

I took this at Dinosaur Point in California. It's about as far away from the city lights I could get in about an hour's drive. It was a new moon that evening and there was a meteor shower going on. Although I did see a lot of shooting stars, none of them were captured.

The foreground is a composite that I shot separately and tried my darndest to edit it in as seamless as possible. There is obviously a fair amount of editing to these types of photos so I'd like CC on how you feel I did on the post processing.

 

[D-B-J]

Nicely done with the Milky-Way, but the foregound is distracting and ugly. Dead flowers/grass in this scene doesn't make for an interesting foreground. Editing seems alright, but it's not what I would have chosen to use as the foreground.


Cheers!
Jake

 

[jsecordphoto]

Did you completely desaturate your foreground? Also, the white balance for the sky is too magenta (purple). Not a bad start though!

 

[TreeofLifeStairs]

Nicely done with the Milky-Way, but the foregound is distracting and ugly. Dead flowers/grass in this scene doesn't make for an interesting foreground. Editing seems alright, but it's not what I would have chosen to use as the foreground.


Cheers!
Jake

I'd have to agree with you on that. I think it was more just to have something in there to try it out. My options were pretty sparse. I went with what I had available.

 

[TreeofLifeStairs]

Did you completely desaturate your foreground? Also, the white balance for the sky is too magenta (purple). Not a bad start though!

It's not completely desaturated, but yes, I significantly brought it down. The plants are actually a nice green color, but to try and blend them into the scene they are almost black and white. Was that the right choice for getting it blended in better?

The magenta was just an artistic choice. I tried it in the blue range as well and just settled on this version.

I was really hoping you would chime in. I really respect your perspective on astrophotography.

 

[jsecordphoto]

Did you completely desaturate your foreground? Also, the white balance for the sky is too magenta (purple). Not a bad start though!

It's not completely desaturated, but yes, I significantly brought it down. The plants are actually a nice green color, but to try and blend them into the scene they are almost black and white. Was that the right choice for getting it blended in better?

The magenta was just an artistic choice. I tried it in the blue range as well and just settled on this version.

It's pretty obvious that you toned down the saturation significantly, which makes it look less natural. If you're happy with a more purple sky, that's all good, but it doesn't look (and isn't) natural at all. I have been using David Kingham's method for dialing in white balance at night for the last two years or so, which I find works really well. He has presets you can download, but really all the preset does is cranks up the saturation+vibrance to set the WB, then brings back the saturation+vibrance back to 0 once you set the WB.

 

[TreeofLifeStairs]

Did you completely desaturate your foreground? Also, the white balance for the sky is too magenta (purple). Not a bad start though!

It's not completely desaturated, but yes, I significantly brought it down. The plants are actually a nice green color, but to try and blend them into the scene they are almost black and white. Was that the right choice for getting it blended in better?

The magenta was just an artistic choice. I tried it in the blue range as well and just settled on this version.

It's pretty obvious that you toned down the saturation significantly, which makes it look less natural. If you're happy with a more purple sky, that's all good, but it doesn't look (and isn't) natural at all. I have been using David Kingham's method for dialing in white balance at night for the last two years or so, which I find works really well. He has presets you can download, but really all the preset does is cranks up the saturation+vibrance to set the WB, then brings back the saturation+vibrance back to 0 once you set the WB.

Ok, I gave it a shot the way he did it in the video you linked and it came back very yellow, so I went back to the white balance the way it was shot but took off all my hue adjustments that pushed it the magenta direction. I think it does look more natural. I also left the foreground at its original saturation but did do a slight hue adjustment so that the lighting blended better. Let me know what you think.

 

[jsecordphoto]

looking much better! I do use that WB technique for all my night images, but always tweak it a bit once I return the saturation/vibrance back down to 0. Nicely done

 

[TreeofLifeStairs]

Clicking back and forth between the two, I think I like the more natural one better.

Thanks for the help. I'll have to find a place that's got a better foreground now.