The Photographers' Corner - 2021 to ?

[street]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ronstar Bison in Buffalo Rock State Park, Illinois hunkering down in the snow.

Darn, that is another great Bison photo!!! I just don't have the equipment to take quality picture and not sure I will ever get into it. But when I see some of the fine photo work being done, it does make me think about it.

Great photo Ron and thank you again for sharing your work.

[explanade]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 Tripod essential. Very wide angle fast lens like 20mm or wider on a full frame camera. Exposures then aren’t super long, but still long. Yet short compared to the earth’s rotation. Remote shutter release recommended. You need a low noise camera too. Lots of online tutorials. Chisos basin in Big Bend National Park in August is a favorite. One of the very best dark skies in the US, plus Perseid meteor shower.

I once stayed in Tekapo (near the shores of Lake Tekapo). When I booked the stay, I didn't know Tekapo was one of the premier Dark Sky reserves in the world.

They have an observatory near town and you can take a tour which starts at like 11 PM where they take you up to the observatory and they will hook up your DLSR to the telescope and take some pictures for you.

I didn't do the tour. The camera I had was new at the time, with a new lens mount, so it was unlikely they would be able to hook it to their telescope.

But the lodging had a terrace with clear views of the nearby mountains and the sky and I decided what the heck, might as well see what I can get.

Got some pretty good pictures, had a 20 mm F1.8 which I used but the best pictures I got were with the aperture stopped down to around 5.6, 6.3, 8 and all the exposures were short, so there's very little sign of star trails and got relatively low ASA settings, some under 1000.

I don't think I got any recognizable constellations but it's amazing how many stars showed up with exposures of a few seconds. I couldn't see them that well with the naked eye but if you open the shutter long enough, they appear in the shots.

[audreyh1]

There are two types of night sky photography. One is of celestial objects and requires a telescope. The other is more of a landscape of the night sky and can be equally rewarding. You need a really wide angle lens to capture the Milky Way for example. Or just a sky full of stars with mountains silhouetted against it or reflected in an ocean or lake. Goldpaint Photography has a lot of great examples of the latter. https://store.goldpaintphotography.com/

In a really dark sky area where millions of stars are visible it becomes much harder to pick out the constellations, ha ha.

[Ronstar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by explanade I once stayed in Tekapo (near the shores of Lake Tekapo). When I booked the stay, I didn't know Tekapo was one of the premier Dark Sky reserves in the world. They have an observatory near town and you can take a tour which starts at like 11 PM where they take you up to the observatory and they will hook up your DLSR to the telescope and take some pictures for you. I didn't do the tour. The camera I had was new at the time, with a new lens mount, so it was unlikely they would be able to hook it to their telescope. But the lodging had a terrace with clear views of the nearby mountains and the sky and I decided what the heck, might as well see what I can get. Got some pretty good pictures, had a 20 mm F1.8 which I used but the best pictures I got were with the aperture stopped down to around 5.6, 6.3, 8 and all the exposures were short, so there's very little sign of star trails and got relatively low ASA settings, some under 1000. I don't think I got any recognizable constellations but it's amazing how many stars showed up with exposures of a few seconds. I couldn't see them that well with the naked eye but if you open the shutter long enough, they appear in the shots.

My best shot of the Milky Way was with my 20mm 1.8 at 30 secs, F2.0, ISO 2000, 2/3 EV. Central Wisconsin late summer, no lights anywhere in sight. Just sitting around drinking beer in a campground.

A 20mm F1.8 can really get the Milky Way.

[Ronstar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 There are two types of night sky photography. One is of celestial objects and requires a telescope. The other is more of a landscape of the night sky and can be equally rewarding. You need a really wide angle lens to capture the Milky Way for example. Or just a sky full of stars with mountains silhouetted against it or reflected in an ocean or lake. Goldpaint Photography has a lot of great examples of the latter. https://store.goldpaintphotography.com/ In a really dark sky area where millions of stars are visible it becomes much harder to pick out the constellations, ha ha.

Thanks for the link. Some stellar shots there. I'd love to take that shot of Delicate Arch.

[folivier]

street, it's more the photographer than the equipment. Knowing your equipment, which settings to use, and having the ability to envision your photograph before you touch the shutter is what is most important. A great photographer with a cheap camera can take a better photo than a mediocre person with expensive equipment.
And you need to be there. In the snowstorm with the bison. Freezing your *uts off. For maybe hours. Then you might get a chance to take that photograph when the bison looks at you. Thinking what the heck are you doing here?

[explanade]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ronstar Thanks for the link. Some stellar shots there. I'd love to take that shot of Delicate Arch.

I went to a talk and slide show by a guy who did those kinds of shots all the time.

He talked about light painting. He'd have flashlights with some color filter and he said we waves it around on a foreground object like that arch while taking a long exposure of the sky.

He even said some light pollution in the distance could make your astro shots interesting.

But the thing that really discouraged me, he said you have to go not just after sun down but like 10 or 11 PM and drive 50-75 miles from big metro areas to be able to capture these types of shots.

No interest in doing anything like that.

[Ronstar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by explanade I went to a talk and slide show by a guy who did those kinds of shots all the time. He talked about light painting. He'd have flashlights with some color filter and he said we waves it around on a foreground object like that arch while taking a long exposure of the sky. He even said some light pollution in the distance could make your astro shots interesting. But the thing that really discouraged me, he said you have to go not just after sun down but like 10 or 11 PM and drive 50-75 miles from big metro areas to be able to capture these types of shots. No interest in doing anything like that.

Light painting really makes for some great photos. I took a workshop from Xavier Nunez in Chicago. I found light painting to be difficult. Can't dwell on a certain feature while painting or that part will be overexposed. Can't even repaint a certain area. How are you supposed to remember where you painted and where you didn't? I sucked at light painting.

But this guy has it nailed.https://www.nuez.com

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ronstar Thanks for the link. Some stellar shots there. I'd love to take that shot of Delicate Arch.

He does some neat time lapse photography too. I may take a workshop one of these days.

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by explanade I went to a talk and slide show by a guy who did those kinds of shots all the time. But the thing that really discouraged me, he said you have to go not just after sun down but like 10 or 11 PM and drive 50-75 miles from big metro areas to be able to capture these types of shots. No interest in doing anything like that.

West Texas you can stay in dark sky locations, and shoot right where you are or drive a short way. In Big Bend I was right there. Milky Way was up maybe an hour after sunset. I got up one or two nights at 3-4am. No big deal because it was a short walk from our lodging. Davis Mountains area is excellent too.

[explanade]

It just depends on what you want to do. People spend a fortune on long lenses for photographing birds and they apparently have to wait a long time to get certain shots.

No interest in doing that.

I wouldn't mind photographing the aurora borealis but not enough to go to some cold place in the winter.

Not interested in going to the Antarctic.

I remember researching a trip to Torres del Paine. Learned that you had to take some 2-3 hour bus ride from the airport to go to some remote area. Aside from the scenery of that one mountain, not much to do there and weather conditions might be extreme, like very heavy winds which might prevent you from hiking from the lodgings to the lookouts.

OK, there are plenty of beautiful mountains and many of them are much easier to reach and you're not going to some desolate place.

You can enjoy the Alps for instance and be near amenities

[tutan]

Collecting food at low tide.

[tutan]

Sunset over Rarotonga lagoon.

[Ronstar]

^great photos!!

[tutan]

Thank you. It is hard to miss or screw up scenes of obvious beauty. A South Pacific island lagoon is just mesmerizing. All I had to do was keeping the horizon horizontal.
Waxing crescent moon in this one a week ago.

[pacergal]

beautiful

[Ronstar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pacergal beautiful

+1. Awesome sunset shot

[Ronstar]

Fellow hiker after a day hiking in the red rocks of Sedona, Az

[folivier]

On our way home from our cabin we're at friends for a few days in Arizona. Decided to split up that drive so we spent the night at The View hotel in Monument Valley. Woke up to heavy low clouds that lasted all morning so left early since we had a 6 hour drive.
A bit disappointing because we wanted to take a tour into the park but with the low light levels and heavy dark clouds didn't think it would be worth it.
Anyway here is what we had from our balcony:

[street]

folivier, beautiful pictures. Thanks!

Ronstar, the picture of the hike, says it all. We all leave a trail in life from birth to death.

Looks like a great time!!