Star Trails

[AdrianF (Adrian)]

OK this is my first attempt at star trails. I manged to get the alignment on the camera almost right. It doesnt look all that good compared with some of the shots I have seen. I didnt get enough photos (think all up about 70) and I think I over exposed a bit (25s @iso 400 @15s intervals).
Should I go lower with exposure and obviously get more photos. Critisism/advice welcome

Adrian

[alexch (Alex)]

Nice attempt, Adrian.

As for critique - I'd say the stars lack some colour, there is a gap and total exposure time is too short.

When I made star trails from my 15 seconds time lapse shots the exposure settings were 15 seconds at ISO 1600 or 3200 and f/2.8, so yours are under-exposed for a dark sky location (different story in the suburbs). I also batch post-process the images with curves to bring stars out and suppress the Milky Way a little as it looks smeared in the start trails before adding them in Startrails program.

For star trails alone you might be better off with 2 or even 4 minute long exposures and stop the lens down accordingly.

Keep trying

Alex

[AdrianF (Adrian)]

Thanks for the comments. Yes there is a gap in the photo because I am having issues with laptop/software/os. The program (dslr pro) crashes after 50-60 shots and I have to restart the laptop loosing time in the sequence. I have an intervalomter that refuses to work. I will try longer exposures and see how that goes but won't be until about Monday or so. Study tonight and tomorrow and then a trip to Kilcoy/Blackbutt looking for a block of land.

Adrian

[cookie8 (Vincent)]

Good attempt Adrian. You surely had pointed in the right direction with the right focal length. The sky in your photo is too black(underexposed)
I would have used ISO 800 and exposed for 30sec with a wide opened aperture. Burst mode for continuous shooting for say 1 hour(use a remote shutter release cable)so there will be no gaps. Use a free software called Startrails to stack them. Remember to include some foreground landscape to make it more interesting.
Cheers
Vincent

[Liz]

Still a nice image Adrian.
Am a fan of startrails.
Great advice from Vincent and Cookie, will take note myself.

[StarLane]

Hello there,

Forget about DSLR's and computers and stacking for proper star trails. Buy a cheap mechanical film SLR from ebay for next to nothing and set it to bulb with 200-400 iso film for 1-2 hours @ f5.6-f8 and there you have it, perfect star trails. Scan your film at your nearest lab @ High Res, preferably Fuji Frontera (and no I don't work for them, but they leave Kodak in the dark ages) and there you have it, perfect star trails as a digital file with no dramas about failing batteries, computer issues etc.

Try film again, it's fun.

Cheers

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by cookie8

...
I would have used ISO 800 and exposed for 30sec with a wide opened aperture. Burst mode for continuous shooting for say 1 hour(use a remote shutter release cable)so there will be no gaps. ...

And turn off any in camera noise reduction. It usually doubles the time to capture each frame so for every 30 secs of image you get 30 secs of no image.

[AdrianF (Adrian)]

Originally Posted by StarLane

Hello there,

Forget about DSLR's and computers and stacking for proper star trails. Buy a cheap mechanical film SLR from ebay for next to nothing and set it to bulb with 200-400 iso film for 1-2 hours @ f5.6-f8 and there you have it, perfect star trails. Scan your film at your nearest lab @ High Res, preferably Fuji Frontera (and no I don't work for them, but they leave Kodak in the dark ages) and there you have it, perfect star trails as a digital file with no dramas about failing batteries, computer issues etc.

Try film again, it's fun.

Cheers

Just thrown 11 SLR bodies away, kept the lenses tho.

Adrian