Star Storm

invisible · May 24, 2008

Taken last night at Patricia Beach on Lake Winnipeg.

shorty6049 · May 24, 2008

something seems weird about the trees. the star trails look good, but the trees... i dont know they look artifacty...

invisible · May 25, 2008

shorty6049 said:
something seems weird about the trees. the star trails look good, but the trees... i dont know they look artifacty...

You are correct. The original image was a bit noisy, so I processed it with Neat Image. I'm still learning how to use this software, and the "artifacty" trees are the price I had to pay for my newbieness.

I shot this one at f/4 and exposed it for 10 minutes at ISO 200. Is there anything I should have done differently to achieve better results?

shorty6049 · May 25, 2008

not really anything else i can think of. Some people do short (around 2 minute) exposures. that way you dont get noise build-up from sensor heat. you just merge all the images in photoshop or you can use a dedicated stacking program like registax , but its more complicated to use than PS.

RKW3 · May 25, 2008

Looks oversharpened and perhaps a bit compressed.

The pic is really interesting otherwise.

confucious · May 25, 2008

It looks as if you had a light source shining from your bottom left...it could have been faint and there the whole time, or perhaps bright and brief, lasting only a second or so. Either way, It's illuminated the trees strangely and given a diffuse orange/red glow to other trees close by. I think the pic would be far better with no light source, just the silhouette and smeared stars.

As to the noise - could you post the pic before you ninja'd it? Would love to see the trees in the original.

GOod job though

invisible · May 25, 2008

The light source is actually a lame attempt by me to lightpaint the trees with a pocket flashlight. I'm not entirely sure why the light doesn't show equally distributed, though. I agree with you, it would have probably looked better without the light painting.

Here's the image before the noise reduction:

chantal7 · May 25, 2008

Neat! Do you just do a long exposure for that to happen?

invisible · May 25, 2008

chantal7 said:
Neat! Do you just do a long exposure for that to happen?

Yes, and the earth rotating did the rest

MissMia · May 25, 2008

I like the original image before the noise reduction. It might have worked better if more of the trees in front were painted in light. BTW, the stars look great.

invisible · May 25, 2008

MissMia said:
I like the original image before the noise reduction. It might have worked better if more of the trees in front were painted in light. BTW, the stars look great.

That was the intention, but I guess the other trees just refused to absorb the light. I might do it again this week with a stronger flashlight and hopefully the results will be better. Stay tuned...

chantal7 · May 26, 2008

invisible said:
Yes, and the earth rotating did the rest

Sweet. I'm going to have to try that sometime

invisible · May 27, 2008

Bump to ask this question again (for everybody, but especially for those who have experience shooting star trails): Is there anything I should have done differently to achieve better results?

chantal7 · May 28, 2008

May I ask how long of an exposure you did? I forgot to put that in my previous post.

invisible · May 28, 2008

chantal7 said:
May I ask how long of an exposure you did? I forgot to put that in my previous post.

Sure. This one was a 10-minute exposure, f/4 at ISO 200. Make sure the sky is very dark before you shoot (i.e., after 11 PM) on a moonless night. It helps to drive out of town so the city lights don't make the sky lighter (I drove 100 km away from Winnipeg, to give you an idea).