Milky Way

[oldno7]

First time try from my front yard.
I've been playing with it for hours, it is a single exposure.
It is a 30" exposure and there is definite star trails appearing.
I'm guessing I need to be below a 10" exposure?

ISO-1600
F 5.6
30"
18mm

[Celestron]

Your in Utah so your latitude is higher then Texas quite a bit . Meaning your going to have star trails quicker because you are farther away from the southern pole area . But you do have an advantage , you could point at Polaris the northern pole and have less star trails than we would in Texas for the same length of exposer , so you did ok for a tripod mount and 30-sec shot . About the same as i get from my southern location .

[oldno7]

Thanks, any thoughts on improving my post p. I think I slid my sliders in lightroom till I finally decided I didn't know what was right or wrong but I moved most of em.:lol:

[timescapes.org]

Use a faster aperture. At 30mm, 15-20 second exposures should be fine. Shoot RAW, and use the color temp and other settings tweaks to really make the Milky Way pop.

[Celestron]

If you have Canons' DPP ( Digital Photo Professional ) you might want to use the NR a little to bring down the noise but don't use max cause it will soften the image too much . Then you might try adjusting the RGB tab in DPP to help readjust the colors some and last maybe add a little contrast to make the colors pop but very little and brighten the stars . I played with it a little but hard to get very good results with this picture size . Maybe if you work from the original format before reducing size it will come out better . If you have Photo Shop you can do most these adjustments there also , just watch your Histogram and try keeping it within proper measurements . One other thing is that tree . Did you use a flash ? If you did try not using it . The bright treetop kinda takes away from the MW itself . Maybe use another forground if possible .

[oldno7]

Thanks alot guys, definitely something to work on.
The tree is illuminated by a streetlight about 2 blocks away.
I was going to re-try shooting last night but we had smoke from a forest fire drift into the area and muted the sky.
I was trying to do post in lightroom, should I change over to DPP? I also loaded it as a single image in DSS and couldn't get the settings where it looked very good, probably to be expected with a single image in that program.
I truly appreciate you guys giving advice.

[CaptainTonus]

Like timescapes said, a faster aperture is going to help a lot--as will a wider-angle lens. Try shooting at ISO 800 while shooting at a wider aperture and it will lower the amount of noise. What lens were you using for this shot?

[oldno7]

It is a 18-55 IS
Shot at 18mm
I could have opened one stop to f4
I did try some shots at 800, but when I did I cut the exposure down to 10".
I'll try opening to f4,iso800,30" shots tonight if the skies cooperate.
Thanks to all for taking time to help the new guy.

[CaptainTonus]

It is a 18-55 IS
Shot at 18mm
I could have opened one stop to f4
I did try some shots at 800, but when I did I cut the exposure down to 10".
I'll try opening to f4,iso800,30" shots tonight if the skies cooperate.
Thanks to all for taking time to help the new guy.

Yeah, shoot in M, force it to overexpose to 30 seconds if you have to, and you should be able to shoot at f/3.5 on the kit lens. Shoot that sucker wide-open.

[oldno7]

Thanks Captain
And I used to think night time meant, it was time to go to bed.:lol:

[CaptainTonus]

Thanks Captain
And I used to think night time meant, it was time to go to bed.:lol:

No way, you can't go to sleep until you get that perfect shot!

[oldno7]

nuther try last night.
This one is battling street lights and a 1/2 moon
maybe I'm going to have to leave my front yard.

ISO-800
18mm
f3.5
30"
Little to much in the way of trails @ 30"

[CaptainTonus]

You may be able to bring that out more with some post-processing, but looks better. Now get your hands on an ultra-wide angle lens and try again and you'll be amazed at what you get.