Star trails with new technique

This was my first attempt at "Star Trails" using a new technique (to me).
Instead of firing the shutter with the bulb setting I saw this new technique on an astrophotography website.
Basically set the camera to continuous drive mode, set the TV to 30" then lock the shutter down.
The camera will then click away every 30"s until the battery runs out or the CF card fills up.
Then use this Photoshop action to stack the images automatically. it can be got from here. http://www.schursastro​photography.com …photoshop/start​rails.html
This picture is 220 individual frames.

HOSTED PHOTO
please log in to view hosted photos in full size.

Well done, looks great!!!

I'm confused and what are the two vertical lines?

Airplanes.

Nice shot!

Nice, I like it. Probably one of the longest, (time-wise), star-trails shots I've seen. I want to try something like this, but have it running from dusk-til-dawn...get a good 10 hours worth or something. Not sure it'd look very good though...there's a limit to these shots I think.

Thanks for that link, that'll prove useful.

Really nice Bob . Might raise the contrast a notch .

I read in a magazine recently that you can get good results by manually focusing on a tree for example and setting your exposure. Once happy take 100 shots but on the 99th one paint the tree with a torch and on the 100th one put the lens cap on.

Then using some software that I can't remember for the life of me what it's called stack them all together, the results in the magazine were quite impressive and I suppose you always get to delete any that have aeroplanes etc in.

Not tried it myself as yet, but as soon as we have the right conditions and I amnot working I intend to give it a go.

yea i have been using this technique for a while.. heheh didnt think it was a new.. There is another software called stair trails which i found to be easier than photoshop.

Anyways lovely shot man!! great work!!

Excellent looking image bob_bobski. Mind if I ask what camera, lens and setting were used? The reason I ask is I am experimenting with settings on circum-polar shots and seeing the different results. As proof here is an image from last weekend. Shot with a 5D ISO 125 AV 5.0 Lens 24-70mm @24mm. This is a three image stack with each image being 30 minutes long. The total is 90 mintes of exposure which is 20 minutes shorter than yours but close enough for my purposes.

HOSTED PHOTO
please log in to view hosted photos in full size.

continuous drive? what camera body does that? *curious*

Yeah what do you mean by continuous? Won't you still have to have something holding down the shutter button?

maybe he means burst mode? Then just lock down shutter release cable?

Thats what i did..

Thanks very much for all the great comments.
To answer some of the questions:~
Yes jcw122 i did mean burst mode (thanks siddr20)
The camera settings were F4, ISO400, 17mm and each shot was 30"
I'm still undecided on the plane trails, some time I like them, other time I wish I could get a clear sky.
I've uploaded a larger version to http://www.flickr.com/​photos/svacher/3015493​668/ on this version you can see 4 or 5 plane trails and if you look hard, from the polar star towards the lower right corner there is another streak, I don't know if this is a meteor or a satellite.

Bob

somethingsimple wrote in post #6651257
continuous drive? what camera body does that? *curious*

ya know - just like cruise control on a car

Thats a great shot!