STS-130 Nighttime Shuttle Launch [Archive] - Canon Digital Photography Forums

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Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 07:44

This was only my second time seeing a Shuttle Launch from the Cape (from a public areas) but this was my first night time Shuttle Launch.

I took this photo from Jetty Park several miles south of the pad and it is a 6min exposure. I would have kept Exif intact but its from my site which is hosted by SmugMug and it strips it. The image amazingly did not need any cropping, only removed a few specs of sensor dust, otherwise image is out of camera.

I'm so excited it came out the way it did!!!

Sigma 10-20 @ 20mm
ISO100
F16
403s

http://www.josephregner.com/photos/783758570_EnDHG-XL.jpg

Eksath

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 07:48

great shot!

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 07:52

Thank you! My heart is still pumping!!

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 08:05

Just to add, here is a Google Map showing where the launch pad was located in relation to where I took the photo.

You can see the pads up at the top and the green arrow is showing my location at the bottom. IIRC its about 7 miles....

http://www.josephregner.com/photos/783776139_52bhF-O.jpg

Harm

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 08:31

Stunning shot, nice work!

sdo

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 08:34

khfoto.no

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 09:34

Wow cool shots and I´m sure it was a great experience too..

PhotosGuy

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 09:42

Those are both very good shots. How did you figure out your 6 minute exposure for the sky?

asysin2leads

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 09:45

Fantastic shots by both of you. Those would be blown up and hung in my office if it were me. I don't use this as often as a lot of people do, but..............

bw!

m3n00b

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 09:51

You knew exactly where the launch would go. Nice positioning!

Mike Deep

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 10:37

Jetty Park is an interesting choice. Nice perspective, and it looks like that position let you dodge most of the cloud deck. Sweet!

TheBigDog

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 12:56

great shots!

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 13:25

Fantastic! That's a very nicely done photo. This was my first live shuttle launch and it was incredible. So sad that that was the last night launch ever.

BTW, Jetty Park is (according to this site) 13.2 miles from the Shuttle launch site. http://www.launchphotography.com/Shuttle_Launch_Viewing.html

I was at Space View Park and my shot doesn't quite have that great arching quality that yours has.

Thats a beautiful shot! You also somehow knew exactly when to stop it so it didn't shoot out of a frame too. Very interesting with all the people taking photo's themselves!

Ahh I guess I got my miles mixed up, I've done the distance calculations a few times but it must be Space View Park thats 7 miles and Jetty Park was 13 miles.... I saw my last launch from the bridge just east of Space View Park and was surprised how quiet it was from there. Jetty Park was MUCH louder than my last launch and seemed closer hehe....

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 13:34

Those are both very good shots. How did you figure out your 6 minute exposure for the sky?

Honestly a rough guess from my previous shuttle launch I witnessed during the day STS-127 IIRC. While I sat and waited for the launch I did multiple tests. Mostly were wide open at F5.6 until by chance a large fishing boat went through the shot in the water and almost blew it out. I knew people mentioned that it lights the night sky up like a sunrise so I suddenly decided to close it up to F16 and did one last test from about 4a-4:06 and I liked the exposure so I stuck with it. Very lucky really....

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 13:35

You knew exactly where the launch would go. Nice positioning!

Gut feeling and getting VERY lucky.... :D

On_looker

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 13:39

Gut feeling and getting VERY lucky.... :DBull **** (j/k). Perfect analysis and research. Awesome shots!

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 13:47

Bull **** (j/k). Perfect analysis and research. Awesome shots!

Haha... thanx!

For the longest I was trying to figure out what the flare is half way on the upwards part of the arc and I think I just figured out that it must be the "Go for throttle up" which now gives it much more meaning to me than just a flare that some may call a "mistake" on the image....

Desertraptor

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 17:22

Well done on both shots

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 21:17

Any advice on submitting something to Airliners.net?

Thats where I first saw a shot like this and gave me the idea to do it on my own.

Also an suggestions on what to do next? How and were to potentially sell the shot? I normally shoot events where sales go to people who participated, I've never tried to sell an image to mass market before...

Thameth

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 21:24

BTW, here is the shot I used for inspiration:

http://www.airliners.net/photo/NASA/Rockwell-Space-Shuttle/0421834/L/&sid=8e785a2d7f5ac8c30e77b915d6219cd8

Tigawoods

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 21:50

spectacular

G22

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 22:01

wow, those are 2 incredible pics - beautiful.

i just posted these 3 pics into another thread...as you can tell I'm not much of a camera guy but I like 2 & 3....I had a lot of fun preparing for this, maybe enough to buy a real camera and get into this a little bit....

http://www.snorkeling.info/images/3.jpg

http://www.snorkeling.info/images/2.jpg

http://www.snorkeling.info/images/1.jpg

any suggestions on how to improve these with photoshop?

bdpaco

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 22:35

awesome shots...I would love to see a shuttle launch in person

Aaagogo

8th of February 2010 (Mon), 23:14

Good job guys, both streaks were nice.

up north in Daytona looked like crap.

http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/4274/img63901.jpg

PhotosGuy

9th of February 2010 (Tue), 10:33

Honestly a rough guess from my previous shuttle launch I witnessed during the day STS-127 IIRC. While I sat and waited for the launch I did multiple tests. Mostly were wide open at F5.6 until by chance a large fishing boat went through the shot in the water and almost blew it out. I knew people mentioned that it lights the night sky up like a sunrise so I suddenly decided to close it up to F16 and did one last test from about 4a-4:06 and I liked the exposure so I stuck with it. Very lucky really.... Good work, not luck. Most people would rather ask someone, (who also may not have a clue!), than run some tests first! ;)

FSUnoles

9th of February 2010 (Tue), 12:51

came across this on the nasa site
http://i49.tinypic.com/1g2m42.jpg
http://mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/detail.cfm?mediaid=45510

kipper

9th of February 2010 (Tue), 13:16

Great capture.

Matt Peters

9th of February 2010 (Tue), 14:41

They are both cracking shots! :D

PicSniper

9th of February 2010 (Tue), 14:56

Beautiful shot! Just BEAUTIFUL!!! Nicely done...

RWatkins

13th of February 2010 (Sat), 18:39

Thameth

20th of February 2010 (Sat), 15:39

This shot was better than this one that made The Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/photo_galleries/article7019378.ece?slideshowPopup=true&articleId=7019378&nSlide=8&sectionName=WorldUSAmericas

Very interesting hehe... Though that shot is credited to the EPA.

Also it looks like due to rescheduling of the next launch of Atlantis my shot is no longer one of the final shots of a night launch as Atlantis is now scheduled to launch Pre-Dawn on April 5th..... :(:cool: