pradag wrote in post #18127395
For people who are getting these milkyway shots, are they visible to the naked eye already? I can't ever make out the milky way by eye and cannot capture any of it, but I know I'm not in the best place (atl, ga + 2 hours away). I'm not sure if I'm doing it wrong or just trying the impossible. Sorry I don't have any examples of what I've got. I can get a bunch of stars, and during the perseids I got an outline if you're imaginative lol. I'm giving it ~20-30 seconds depending, trying with f2.8 - f10 mixed with a little higher iso in some and 100 iso in others, but they all come out unable to see the milkyway.
any comments would be helpful, thanks!
Within major metro areas, it's not visible to the naked eye. On the very outer fringes of a major metro area, it should be faintly visible, if you know where to look. Once you get out into truly rural areas -- even in the east, where there are tons of small towns with moderate pollution -- you should be able to see it well enough to compose your shot with ease.
I would imagine that two hours outside of Atlanta, you should definitely be able to see the MW with the naked eye if you look south at the right time of night (currently, in the early autumn, right after dusk).
Regardless of your camera or tracking equipment, you must use higher than ISO 100. I would use ISO 3200-6400 without a tracker, or ISO 800-1600 with a tracker. And stick at or near the largest aperture (f/2.8, I assume). Using low ISO and apertures narrower than f/4 will result in a black sky, a few faintly visible stars, and not much else -- there's just not enough light for that type of exposure.
