The Money Shot

You could loose yourself for hours looking into that sky!

Epic trip!

I can't really add more to what's already been said, but that's just incredible!

Beautiful shot. Look's like you got the last laugh.

Nice shot! Also, am I the only one who thought of a 'facial' when I read money shot? Yeah I'm dirty minded lol

That is just stunning.

dan_bgblue wrote in post #8384551
I hope you don't mind if I ask how much PP was done to bring out the colors in the sky, as living in the States with all the light pollution, I have never seen a night sky with all that color evident.

Is it natural or enhanced in PP?

I would also be interested in knowing about the extent of PP you did.

This shot was inspired from last first night in Botswana 2 years ago. I recall walking to my cabin along with my son and looking up ... and realizing how many stars are in the sky on a moonless night. Once back in the US, I started looking on POTN for exposure times so as to not create any streak, but expose the heavens with a plan to shoot night sky on my return to Bots this year. Once I learned we were staying at Elephant Sands a night, with it's water hole and nightly game, I had a plan.

No problem giving the info on processing. Actually much less than you will think, as the sky in unpolluted areas of the world show the milky way quite easily. I added saturation a very little to the entire image, then created a masked layer where boosted contrast for the sky and also bumped the saturation a tad more on the sky. Flattened, resized and sharpened. That's it.

BTW, I have about 10 other "interesting" images where the 2 elephants that came down to the water (1 in this exposure) were moving around and created ghost-like effects.

Buddy

buddy4344 wrote in post #8395647
BTW, I have about 10 other "interesting" images where the 2 elephants that came down to the water (1 in this exposure) were moving around and created ghost-like effects.

Buddy

I'd love to see them. "Experimental" stuff like this is quite interesting!

Speaking of "facial" and not to rain of the parade of an extraordinary shot, it would have been nice to have gotten the elephant's face instead of the other end. Well, at least he was wasn't taking a dump.

I thought that WAS his face! Don't I faintly see two tusks and an eye? Of course my dad always said - I don't know my a@@ from my elbow.

Superb. That sky is stunning.

Thanks for the comments. I do have several of the rear, but (I think) this one is of the face. More clear in the original image than in the downsized. That said, more angle on the animal would be great, but hard to control that element when you are shooting into significant darkness.

philk54 wrote in post #8397109
I thought that WAS his face! Don't I faintly see two tusks and an eye? Of course my dad always said - I don't know my a@@ from my elbow.

LMAO it definitely looks like the front if you glance at it real quick...I
thought I saw small tusks and the trunk..

Awesome Photo. If you get a siomilar oppurtunity, try getting the face against the lake and sky.

Cheers

That's an incredible shot -- the sky looks unreal!