Milky Way Rising over Lostock Dam

[iceman]

This is one of my favourites from IISAC2013 so far - a panorama taken at Lostock Dam. On the Saturday night of the star party, Andrew Murrell and I went for a drive in search of interesting foregrounds and found this great scene at Lostock Dam, about 20 minutes drive from the camp.

It's a 9-frame panorama, captured with the Canon 6D, Samyang 14mm, f/2.8, 30s exposures @ ISO6400.

- Large (http://www.mikesalway.com.au/download/418)

Thanks for looking, comments welcome.

[gregbradley]

Yes that is a very good image. I like it too. A nice range of colours, the reflections, the interesting composition, elements of near and far. Also not dominated by green air glow and some nice bluish Milky Way there.

Greg.

[h0ughy]

looks a great shot, was that from the picnic area?

[iceman]

Thanks Greg, I agree about the colours - the yellowy/brown on the trees from the nearby spotlight gave them a nice hue, combined with some airglow and the clouds.




Yep, sure is Dave. There's a bright spotlight shining from the building up the top, but if we went right next to the water it was blocked by a tree so we could take these.

[CapturingTheNight]

Love this one Mike. :thumbsup: One of your best ever and (IMHO) your best from the camp that I have seen. The polarie shots are good but they are almost too detailed as night sky landscape shots (if that makes any sense- again IMHO). THIS is a nightscape! If it was my shot I would have only made one small change. I would have cropped out that sign on the left edge of frame. My eye went straight to it.

[mexhunter]

Realy beautiful, Mike!

[Rod771]

That's awesome!

Well done Mike :thumbsup:

[Octane]

Sharp and sparkly. I agree, one of your best. :)

H

[Irish stargazer]

Lovely shot Mike

[Ross G]

Beautiful looking panorama Mike.

Great composition.

I love the colours and reflections.

Ross.

[iceman]

Thanks Greg, appreciate the feedback.
I might go back and clone out that sign :)




Thanks Cesar, much appreciated.




Many thanks Rod.




Thanks H. I love a good panorama :)




Thanks for your comments :)




Thanks Ross, the reflections came out great considering there was a bit of a breeze that night. I remember commenting to Andrew that I wished it was more still so we could pick up more reflections. Would've been even better on a still night.

[matt34]

Awesome shot Mike. The sky, the reflection all look good. How do you handle the distortion with the 14mm and stitching shots together? It looks seamless.

I've learnt from your recent shots that a bit of cloud can be a good thing, it can add some depth, contrast & colour to the sky

[iceman]

Thanks Matt!

You're right - some cloud is great at times :) It can be a bit of a drama when stitching, as it can take a few minutes to take the 9+ photos of a panorama. In this case I had to use Microsoft ICE as AutoPano Pro struggled to stitch it properly.

As long as you have plenty of overlap, and take the shots in portrait mode, they usually stitch up ok.

[matt34]

I'll have to look into Microsoft ICE, hadn't heard of it before.

Cant wait for my trip to NZ in about a month, hoping to get 1 nice pano like all the ones you've been showing from your IISAC trip. Previously a bit of cloud around turned me off braving the cold but will still head out and see what happens :)

[ourkind]

Another beauty Mike! Lovely :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup: