Milky Way and Magellanic clouds 7 panel mosaic

[gregbradley]

Here is a 7 panel mosaic I took last Thursday night.

Nikon D800E, Nikon 14-24mm ED F2.8 at 21mm. 7 x 30 seconds IS06400 in RAW.

Capture NX2, PT Gui Pro, Photoshop CS3.

http://upload.pbase.com/image/145926016

Greg.

[RickS]

Lovely and panoramic, Greg!

[gregbradley]

Thanks Rick.

I have been wanting to do a Milky Way Panorama again since I did a rough one about 4 years ago.

Greg.

[naskies]

Nice. That's some intense airglow!

[DavidTrap]

It's certainly an impressive view Greg.

I'm curious as to whether 6400ISO is pushing things too far, especially with the sky glow. I have found a big difference in the "brightness of the background" in similar images at 3200 and 6400.

DT

[jjjnettie]

Lovely work there Greg. :)
I'm heading away for a few days this week to catch some dark sky goodness. If I come home with something half as good as this I'll be very happy indeed.

[CapturingTheNight]

Great pano Greg :thumbsup: I have a real fond spot for images like this and this is a very nicely done one. It's an interesting point David raises. Obviously the D800E can handle that ISO exceptionally well but you are already getting great light gathering ability from the F/2.8 aperture. But then again I guess it is always best to overexpose (without blowing the highlights) and bring back the exposure in post, rather than under expose and trying to recover the fainter stuff in post, which leads to more noise.

[FlashDrive]

You always take great photos Greg ... really nice ..!!

Flash .. !!

[iceman]

Really nice Greg, very well done!

[SkyViking]

Lovely panorama Greg, and nice contrast with the black silhouette of the landscape. Is the dim light on the ground from the Milky Way alone?

[gregbradley]

Yes it is. I tried various white balances to minimise this. This is less than some settings plus I tweaked it again in post processing.



Possibly David. I did 2 images of the LMC and SMC one at 6400 and one at 12800. I checked them out this morning and the 6400 can be made to be very similar to the 12800 brightness wise and the green skyglow is less in the 6400. So I'll check out ISO3200 to see how that works out.



Thanks JJJ. I hope you get some clear nights. I did this on the first night and got there late. The next 2 nights were overcast and a writeoff. That's astrophotography for you.



That is pretty much my approach but it depends on the setup I am using at the time. If it had've been clear another night I was planning to put the DSLR on my PMX mount and do some autoguided exposures to see how it all works at different ISOs and exposure times. But for 30 seconds so far ISO6400 seems best. Its all trial and error and I am not totally settled on a formula yet.



Thanks very much for the nice compliment.



Cheers Mike. Its nice to be able to post something. Your long line of superb images has set a high standard.



Yes it is.

If I had another clear night I was planning on playing a torch on the foreground as that is quite a nice rock formation in the centre - its 2 rocks on top of each other like a snowman.

Greg.

[StephenM]

Looks great Greg!

Cheers,
Stephen

[gregbradley]

Thanks Stephen.

Greg.

[Paul Haese]

Nice Greg. One of the better compositions that I have seen.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Paul.

It was a pretty cold and windy night as well!

Greg.