Star Trails

I've been wanting to shoot the milky way and star trails but living in NYC that's pretty tough to do So I dug into some old files I have when I visited Yosemite late last year and decided to try stacking images to create a star trail photo. I found 2 images that were close enough for stacking with StarStax. Yeah only 2 images When at Yosemite I wasn't planning on stacking multiple images for star trails. Next time I will plan for it They were shot a bit apart which is why I have the dash in the trails but it was good enough for me to play around with Thanks for looking guys!

P.S. How do you guys get the trails to pop? I tried levels, curves, contrast...nothing made the trails brighter/pop

P.S.S. If I'm not too lazy I might cone in the dashes on the brighter trails

Good one, really good

Levels is one of the most vile, evil, sliders in Photoshop

I use the following technique on almost everything I process and definitely everything I print.

Contrast Mask (Mac keys. For a PC, if I'm not mistaken, Ctrl = Command and Alt is Alt)

Open the image in Photoshop. I think it works in Elements too.

Make sure Channels are visible (Window -> Channels)

Command-click the RGB Channel. You should see "marching ants" on your image

Down at the bottom of the Layers palette there is a white and black circle. Alt Click that. Don't let go of Alt. When the window pops up, while still holding Alt, click the Curves selection. Then ok until you get to your image with the curves dialog displayed

Now we get to the creative part. I "usually" grab the line about 20% from the bottom and pull it slightly down. Then I "usually" grab the line about 20% from the top and drag it up. I tweak the setting by watching the image and adjusting until I like what I see. Click the eyeball icon next to the layer that is created to see with / without. That's when you really see the difference.

The only thing, other than screwing the image up by over doing it, that you have to watch for is haloing. Keep an eye on the dark edges. Zoom in. Make sure there are no halos.

When this technique was demonstrated to me the person showing me the technique grabbed the line in the middle and pulled it up. For the image that he was working on that worked fine. There is no set way to use this technique.

After I do this I follow up with a midtone contrast action. If I can figure out a way to post it I will. Loading actions, if you haven't done it, is pretty easy. Using them is even easier.

This is AWESOME!!!!! Thanks so much Mike!!!

Mike6158 wrote in post #15013145
Levels is one of the most vile, evil, sliders in Photoshop

I use the following technique on almost everything I process and definitely everything I print.

Contrast Mask (Mac keys. For a PC, if I'm not mistaken, Ctrl = Command and Alt is Alt)

Open the image in Photoshop. I think it works in Elements too.

Make sure Channels are visible (Window -> Channels)

Command-click the RGB Channel. You should see "marching ants" on your image

Down at the bottom of the Layers palette there is a white and black circle. Alt Click that. Don't let go of Alt. When the window pops up, while still holding Alt, click the Curves selection. Then ok until you get to your image with the curves dialog displayed

Now we get to the creative part. I "usually" grab the line about 20% from the bottom and pull it slightly down. Then I "usually" grab the line about 20% from the top and drag it up. I tweak the setting by watching the image and adjusting until I like what I see. Click the eyeball icon next to the layer that is created to see with / without. That's when you really see the difference.

The only thing, other than screwing the image up by over doing it, that you have to watch for is haloing. Keep an eye on the dark edges. Zoom in. Make sure there are no halos.

When this technique was demonstrated to me the person showing me the technique grabbed the line in the middle and pulled it up. For the image that he was working on that worked fine. There is no set way to use this technique.

After I do this I follow up with a midtone contrast action. If I can figure out a way to post it I will. Loading actions, if you haven't done it, is pretty easy. Using them is even easier.

Sweeeet!

One interesting and controversial way I've found to make your star trails pop is with a selective sharpening to the sky. Lots of sharpening. It makes the brighter trails shine more and brings out some of the fainter ones which may have been hidden. Just a suggestion if you want to try it.

Thanks scorpio1155!

scorpio1155 wrote in post #15017228
Sweeeet!

Thanks lifeinpixels! I'll give it a try.

lifeinpixels wrote in post #15017578
One interesting and controversial way I've found to make your star trails pop is with a selective sharpening to the sky. Lots of sharpening. It makes the brighter trails shine more and brings out some of the fainter ones which may have been hidden. Just a suggestion if you want to try it.

Lovely shot!


And thank you Mike, for the great bit of processing advice too