Cornish Night Sky

by mcrtchly

Sterennow (stars). The Milky Way above Greenburrow engine house at Ding Dong Mine, Cornwall. This a composite of a foreground shot illuminated by moonlight (120secs at ISO 200) and a single 4 minute exposure of the night sky. Uniquely the Astrotracer function of the Pentax K1 allows for such a long exposure in a single shot at a relatively low ISO of 800 which gives sharp details of the stars without the noise present using other cameras with a much higher ISO.
Uploaded12/10/2019 - 18:28
CategoryLandscape / Travel
Shutter SpeedN/A
Aperturef/2.8
ISO800
Focal Length15mm

alfpics
Posted 12/10/2019 - 20:06 Link
A 'wowser' of a shot. I have had a few attempts with my camera, but need to persist a bit more methinks! Do you know why one gets the corner stars 'trailing'?
Andy
mcrtchly
Posted 12/10/2019 - 21:48 Link
alfpics wrote:
A 'wowser' of a shot. I have had a few attempts with my camera, but need to persist a bit more methinks! Do you know why one gets the corner stars 'trailing'?

Andy, thanks for your kind comments. The star trails at the edges is probably due to the wide field of view (with a wide angle lens). The astrotracer appears to not fully be able to rotate and move the sensor to compensation for the earth's rotation and the lens distortion. You can overcome this be either reducing the exposure time or using a longer focal length and taking several images to make a mosaic. Sometimes I use the excellent Pentax 35mm F2.0 lens and take 6 or more images in two rows to make a mosaic. Joining the images can be tricky but I use the ptgiu software to do mosaics.
Posted 13/10/2019 - 11:54 Link
Excellent!
senn
Posted 13/10/2019 - 12:00 Link
very well done !..
senn
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go4IT
Posted 13/10/2019 - 21:43 Link
That structure is SO interesting in and of itself, and triply so in this context. Picture of the Month or my name is not Go4IT. Wow! and Wow again.
Edited by go4IT: 13/10/2019 - 21:44
alfpics
Posted 13/10/2019 - 22:19 Link
mcrtchly wrote:
alfpics wrote:
A 'wowser' of a shot. I have had a few attempts with my camera, but need to persist a bit more methinks! Do you know why one gets the corner stars 'trailing'?

Andy, thanks for your kind comments. The star trails at the edges is probably due to the wide field of view (with a wide angle lens). The astrotracer appears to not fully be able to rotate and move the sensor to compensation for the earth's rotation and the lens distortion. You can overcome this be either reducing the exposure time or using a longer focal length and taking several images to make a mosaic. Sometimes I use the excellent Pentax 35mm F2.0 lens and take 6 or more images in two rows to make a mosaic. Joining the images can be tricky but I use the ptgiu software to do mosaics.

Thanks for the extra info!
Andy
Bagworth
Posted 19/10/2019 - 11:52 Link
Quite jealous of that one. Nicely done. I need to get some practice with that function.
If you don't ask you'll never know
morpheus71
Posted 03/11/2019 - 22:41 Link
Superb

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