Road to Beyond

iceman (Mike) · #1 09-10-2013, 06:31 AM

I’ve always wanted to get a shot like this, and my recent trip to Monkey Mia in WA gave me the chance.

- Large
- Blog

The road leads directly to Venus, just above the horizon. The yellow glow to the left is the town of Denham, about 25km away. There’s some green airglow around too. I noticed on the back of the camera at the time and was hoping it would show up in the processed shot.

Monkey Mia is a very remote little holiday destination on the Coral Coast of WA. The place was made famous because wild dolphins come to the beach to be fed every morning. I was lucky enough to be picked to feed a dolphin on one of the mornings we were there!

This is a 5 image vertical panorama, captured with the 6D, 14-24, f/2.8, 30s exposures @ ISO6400. I hope you enjoy! Not a single car interrupted the 20 minutes I spent standing in the middle of the road capturing this and other shots

Thanks for looking!

sheeny (Al) · #2 09-10-2013, 06:45 AM

Very nice Mike. An alignment like that can't be ignored!

Al.

nebulosity. (Jo) · #3 09-10-2013, 07:22 AM

WOW!! That's a beauty Mike

I would seriously put that on my wall.

Cheers
Jo

Man alive it's good

leon · #4 09-10-2013, 07:30 AM

That is an excellent capture Mike, I know you have done many like this however i reckon this is one of the best i have seen from you, well done. IMHO

Leon

Larryp (Laurie) · #5 09-10-2013, 07:51 AM

Great shot, Mike!

Rod771 (Rod) · #6 09-10-2013, 08:23 AM

Fantastic! The shot just draws you in.

Very very nice Mike!

Congratulations, this image is now IOTW

...... well, it should be

gregbradley · #7 09-10-2013, 08:27 AM

Fabulous use of perspective.

Greg.

alexch (Alex) · #8 09-10-2013, 09:06 AM

Very nice, Mike! The alignment of the road dividing mark and Venus is sublime

RB (Andrew) · #9 09-10-2013, 09:25 AM

That is unique.
Well done on capturing a great vista like this Mike.
I can almost hear the Close Encounters theme building up as I look at the scene.

RickS (Rick) · #10 09-10-2013, 10:42 AM

That's a lovely composition. Well conceived and executed.

multiweb (Marc) · #11 09-10-2013, 10:58 AM

Encounter of the third kind. Very nice framing indeed.

Octane (Humayun) · #12 09-10-2013, 11:10 AM

Fabulous composition, Mike. Easily one of your best!

My only criticism is the saturation. But, I know that's your thing.

H

alocky (Andrew lockwood) · #13 09-10-2013, 11:12 AM

Hi mike,
Lovely shot indeed! You must have been capturing this while I was at the pinnacles. Quick question: you mention it's a 5 frame panorama. Were the individual frames taken with the camera in landscape mode, did you change focus, and is this the complete mosaic or a crop?
Thanks
Andrew.

Astro_Bot · #14 09-10-2013, 11:19 AM

A very nice shot indeed.

rogerg (Roger) · #15 09-10-2013, 11:33 AM

Great shot

MortonH · #16 09-10-2013, 01:41 PM

Nice. Monkey Mia is an awesome place.

dvj (John) · #17 09-10-2013, 04:42 PM

Holy Moly. Look at that sky! That is an APOD for sure. Pure magic.

j

CapturingTheNight (Greg) · #18 09-10-2013, 04:53 PM

Brilliant Shot Mike! One of your best for sure. Got to love when things line up like that. My only critique (and I hope you don't mind) is the cropping/aspect ratio. It just looks a little.........squashed. Would have loved to see either more ground, more sky, or less on the edges to get a classic 2x3 ratio. But I'm nitpicking. Cracker of an image!

kinetic (Steve) · #19 09-10-2013, 05:21 PM

That is a pretty impressive pic Mike!

Steve

iceman (Mike) · #20 09-10-2013, 05:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sheeny

Very nice Mike. An alignment like that can't be ignored!

Al.

Thanks Al, I had seen where Venus was the night before, and that the road from Denham to Monkey Mia was mostly East-West, I just had to find a straight spot of road where Venus was dead ahead

I scoped it out the night before, driving back from Denham after sunset and so it was easy enough to find the next night.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nebulosity.

WOW!! That's a beauty Mike

I would seriously put that on my wall.

Cheers
Jo

Man alive it's good

Thanks Jo, appreciate the support

Quote:

Originally Posted by leon

That is an excellent capture Mike, I know you have done many like this however i reckon this is one of the best i have seen from you, well done. IMHO

Leon

Cheers Leon, nice of you to say. Thanks.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Larryp

Great shot, Mike!

Thanks Larry!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rod771

Fantastic! The shot just draws you in.

Very very nice Mike!

Congratulations, this image is now IOTW

...... well, it should be

Cheers Rod, thanks for the feedback

I very rarely award myself an IOTW

Quote:

Originally Posted by gregbradley

Fabulous use of perspective.

Greg.

Thanks Greg. I had the tripod down as low as it could go to get plenty of road.

Quote:

Originally Posted by alexch

Very nice, Mike! The alignment of the road dividing mark and Venus is sublime

Thanks Alex - it worked out really well and just how I'd planned it in my mind.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RB

That is unique.
Well done on capturing a great vista like this Mike.
I can almost hear the Close Encounters theme building up as I look at the scene.

haha thanks RB, appreciate the feedback.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RickS

That's a lovely composition. Well conceived and executed.

Thanks Rick! I love it when a plan works out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by multiweb

Encounter of the third kind. Very nice framing indeed.

Cheers Marc, much appreciated.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Octane

Fabulous composition, Mike. Easily one of your best!

My only criticism is the saturation. But, I know that's your thing.

H

Thanks H. I do love my saturation

Quote:

Originally Posted by alocky

Hi mike,
Lovely shot indeed! You must have been capturing this while I was at the pinnacles. Quick question: you mention it's a 5 frame panorama. Were the individual frames taken with the camera in landscape mode, did you change focus, and is this the complete mosaic or a crop?
Thanks
Andrew.

Hey Andrew. Thanks. The frames were in landscape mode. I didn't change focus at all, it was on wide open f/2.8 for all shots. It's pretty much the whole mosaic - very little cropping top or bottom or sides. A bit of warping to fill some slight areas in the corners/sides.

I had plenty of overlap between the 5 frames.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Astro_Bot

A very nice shot indeed.

THanks heaps!

Quote:

Originally Posted by rogerg

Great shot

Cheers Roger!

Quote:

Originally Posted by MortonH

Nice. Monkey Mia is an awesome place.

Thanks Morton. It sure is. We loved it there!

Quote:

Originally Posted by dvj

Holy Moly. Look at that sky! That is an APOD for sure. Pure magic.

j

Thanks heaps! Appreciate the kind words.

Quote:

Originally Posted by CapturingTheNight

Brilliant Shot Mike! One of your best for sure. Got to love when things line up like that. My only critique (and I hope you don't mind) is the cropping/aspect ratio. It just looks a little.........squashed. Would have loved to see either more ground, more sky, or less on the edges to get a classic 2x3 ratio. But I'm nitpicking. Cracker of an image!

Thanks Greg, and I don't mind at all. You could be right - I haven't tried any other crops. I almost went for 1:1 square crop by cutting off more of the top of the sky, but I haven't tried it yet.

I can try cutting off some edges for a more 2:3, but I didn't want to lose too much of the road. Will give it a go and see.

Thanks again for the feedback!