Post your Milky Way shots

[fritzd]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3286/2727784047_73a7102af4.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3135/2738696986_bfbd124bd5.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3178/2741253506_5be0b9b841.jpg\

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fritzdiorico/sets/72157606537003321/

[Celestron]

Very nice Fritzd ! Looks like you have some dark skies , wheres your location ?

[fritzd]

Thanks! I'm from the Philippines, Cebu City to be exact. I had to go to a far away isolated island though, to get this shot. =))

[Nighthound]

These are awesome fritzd. Somehow I pictured the Philippines to be extremely dark. I guess light pollution is quickly closing in on us all. Great job on these. Beautiful!

Here's a few from one dark sky site that I shoot from on the ocean.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y67/Nighthd/Astrophotography/Piggy%20Back/mwvrywide3cc.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y67/Nighthd/Astrophotography/Piggy%20Back/mwwd07b.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y67/Nighthd/Astrophotography/Piggy%20Back/milkywyrev3.jpg

[Adrena1in]

I have somewhat light-polluted skies, and the night I took this shot wasn't the best, but I had only borrowed a lens off a friend and needed to get it back to him, so it was do or die really.

It's only a single 4-minute frame at 10mm, ISO800, f/3.5 I think. I did take a few shots, but the clouds were rolling in and a stack of all the frames was nowhere as good as a single frame. I adjusted the contrast to bring out the Milky Way, but blew out the right hand side with light pollutions. I still quite like it though. (It does look better in Thumbnail form! ;) )
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/1980/milkyway4min25percentppzh9.th.jpg (http://img156.imageshack.us/my.php?image=milkyway4min25percentppzh9.jpg)

[acchildress]

What great shots!

It's hard to believe that this is what's up there behind all that "grey" light at night.

[igotmilk]

Amazing pictures. I love the first one the most Nighthound.

[HaroldC3]

Here are my best attempts.

[Celestron]

Very nice images everyone !! At the moment i don't have any MW images with my digital . Someday perhaps !

[Sky of the Plains]

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr148/Tyler_greatsky/DSC_3079.jpg

http://i478.photobucket.com/albums/rr148/Tyler_greatsky/Officalmilkyway.jpg

These are my best for now...

[sderic]

Here's a couple of mine:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/50/151718277_26619339d6.jpg (http://farm1.static.flickr.com/50/151718277_26619339d6_o.jpg)

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/209/498891807_5e6f066eda.jpg (http://farm1.static.flickr.com/209/498891807_6677057da1_o.jpg)

[Celestron]

Great images Sky of the Plains !! Even better you caught an excellent meteorite & Jupiter ! Thats a Plus +++ !

Sderic , you have some excellent wide field shots also ! The Pipe Nebulae shows up very nice ! I see you caught Jupiter right beside the Pipe also !

[Sky of the Plains]

Thanks Ron.

After looking at these other images, I realize I need to piggyback the Camera on the scope to get a shutter speed over 50s.

Great images everyone.

[Raikyn]

This was my attempt

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/1165/milky3800x533jn8.jpg

Not bad light pollution for a city I guess :lol:

[Celestron]

You have it upside down , rotate it 180-degs and you'll have the perspective right . Looks like you might have over sharpened . How many images do you have of this shot and what camera did you use also ? This looks like one of my previous attempts of the MW at a very dark place . Only problem i only could get 30-secs max . What were your settings and timing ? I think if you reprocess it it could be a very nice image . Can you post original ?

[Raikyn]

Upside down??
It depends on your perspective, remember I'm from the southern hemisphere ;)

As for the shots it was with a 1Dmk2 and 50mm f1.4 lens.
iso 800 f 2.2 10 sec
30 shots taken and stacked along with some dark frames if I remember right.

[Celestron]

Upside down??
It depends on your perspective, remember I'm from the southern hemisphere ;)



Sorry , i didn't realize you were that far south . Looks to be around 36-deg south the equator ? I could see why it fits your perspective now .

[fritzd]

any more shots?

[bonzi13]

Could someone explain one of the best/easiest way for a newb like me using a Rebel XTi and a standard tripod to get beautiful shots like these?

[Adrena1in]

Could someone explain one of the best/easiest way for a newb like me using a Rebel XTi and a standard tripod to get beautiful shots like these?

What lenses do you have? And what are your skies like? At a very dark site the Milky Way can start to appear in images of relatively short exposure times, depending on the aperture of the lens of course. I've taken 30s shots at 10mm f/3.5 at dark sites and with a little lightening in PS the Milky Way starts to appear nicely. For more detail you can take multiple shots and stack them in something like Deep Sky Stacker. At 10mm FL you could probably go a little longer than 30s without getting too much in the way of star trails as well.

[bonzi13]

I could get to a dark site, that's not really a problem I don't believe (I live in rural Iowa). I have the standard kit lens (18-55mm f/3.5). I enjoy taking star trails but, I know after a short time the trails start to appear. How easy of a program is Deep Sky Stacker to use, and where do I get it?

[Adrena1in]

Deep Sky Stacker is very easy to use, and you can get it here (http://deepskystacker.free.fr/english/index.html).

At 18mm I suppose trails start after around 20 seconds or so, so limit your exposures to roughly what you think is acceptable, and see how you get on with DSS. I took 50 or 60 30s shots once, over the space of about 40 minutes, at 18mm using a fixed tripod, and DSS did a pretty good job of lining up the shots, even rotating each one slightly as the stars rotated across the sky...it's a clever piece of software.

[SamHunter]

Are shots like these impossible in a city?

[Adrena1in]

I don't know how well a light-pollution filter will work against lights within a city, but they do a pretty good job against the light pollution I get at my fairly good site...someone else might be able to answer that one.

[Nighthound]

Are shots like these impossible in a city?

You won't get the best results when the night sky competes with light pollution. If you can't make out the Milky Way with the naked eye(even faintly) then you're going to have your work cut out for you in resolving detail and achieving color accuracy. All that LP will be competing against and consequently neutralizing much of the good data. Good photographic design light pollution filters work very well but they don't eliminate all of the LP. Your best bet is s trip to dark skies, you'll get better results and enjoy much better views. Give it a try from the city first and see what you get, can't hurt to try.

[timescapes.org]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3277/2565058574_a5f8bc79de_b.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3205/2852992351_50a01b3ee4_b.jpg

[SamHunter]

is there a tutorial on how to do this anywhere?

[Adrena1in]

is there a tutorial on how to do this anywhere?

It's actually easier than you might think. Here's what I would suggest you try.

1) Go to as dark a site as you reasonably can.
2) Use a tripod, your shortest focal length lens* and a remote shutter release.
3) Start by zooming in as much as possible on a bright star and focus it as best you can with Manual Focus. Live View is a great help here.
4) Zoom out again, making sure you don't alter the focus.
5) Set the exposure to "BULB" and the aperture as wide open as possible.
6) Turn on Mirror Lock Up, though this isn't vital at wide angles and long exposures.
7) Point the camera towards the Milky Way, which hopefully you'll be able to see.
8) Fire off a series of exposures from 30s to several minutes each.
9) Go home and be amazed at what your camera managed to capture.

:)

* I personally think you want to go wider than 20mm to get a great Milky Way shot. 10mm is my preferred focal length.

[bonzi13]

What would be a good ISO to start at, or is that something I should just mess around with?

Timescapes.org, is that just one shot or several stacked? I don't see how it could be several shots because the ground in the photos is not blurred from moving the camera, and yet there are barely any visible star trails.

And which way do I look for the Milky Way, was it south?

[fritzd]

search for the constellation scorpius. If you can shoot scorpius, you'll get a huge piece of the milky way. There is also a software called STELLARIUM. It can be donwloaded for free. Just google it. It can simulate the night sky at any given time in the past, present and future. It contains information on all astronomical bodies known to man. (i think)

for ISO you can go from 400, 800 or even 1600. depends really on you lens aperture.

[bonzi13]

And I thank yee all for the valuable information.