First attempt at a night shot.
Here's my feedback:
This pic shows the problems of long exposures - camera shake (most likely due to the wind) as it's not as sharp as it could be.
You actually dont need to shoot at small apertures to get decent star trail shots. F2.5 may be a little too wide open though; I'd choose F4 next time.
And the most important thing to do is to use lots of shorter exposures and merge them later. It's easy to merge them with the free program called startrails found here.
So I would use a sequence of 10 or 20 second exposures at f4. What you need to do though is to make sure you avoid the camera's noise reduction being applied - the moment the camera has finished taking a shot it must immediately get on with taking another so you do not have interuptions in the trails.
As a K20D user, this means I can only shoot at an ISO of 100 for a maximum of 10 seconds (any further increase in exposure or ISO would activate the noise reduction and the camera would be waiting several precious seconds until it can take another shot) but for a K-7 user you might have more flexibility.
And finally, get a cable release trigger (the type that allows the button to be held down) and have the camera in high speed continous shooting mode.
Leave it for 15 mins or so and you'll start getting a very nice star trail effect.
I was quite 'hard core' with a star trails shot I attempted a few weeks back, and I had captured these trails for several hours:
However you have the benefit of a much clearer night and a great subject - you will be able to get some stunning star trails shots with nowhere near the amount of time I had my K20 taking images for!
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159 posts
16 years
Huntingdonshire
Upon leaving I caught a glimpse of a Radio Telescope.
I went back today,
and found this.......
K7 + Tammy 70-300mm at 300mm f11 125/s
On my way home I went back and had a go at my first night shot.
K7 + Tammy 24mm f2.5 and about 3 minutes.
I should have selected f11 and focused hyperfocally I know! But any other tips before I go back and try again?
Cheerz
MZ
AF Lenses: DA15mm Ltd, DA21mm Limited, DA35mmAL, DA50mm f1.8, DA18-55mmWR, FA28-70mm f4AL, DA50-200mmWR,Tamron SP70-200mm f2.8, AF70-300mm LD Di, SP10-24mm, SP90mm Macro.
MF Lenses: SMC-A 50mm, Adaptall 24mm(CW-24), 135mm(03B), 35-70mm(17A) 80-210mm(03A), Micro-Nikkor55mm, Soligor I-S 200mm f2.8 AIS
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