Came to the comments to say the same thing. I get Adorama wants to sell gear but carrying a light panel on a backpacking trip is NOT realistic. I heard using a cell phone light with a diffuser on top works too.
Assuming the camera was placed 14 meters from the tent and focused there, at F 1.4, everything between 6.2 meters and infinity would be in sharp, perfect focus!
I started doing glowing tents in the early 80s I would drop a glow stick in the tent. Sometimes I could set up for circling stars. Sometimes glowing forest from camp fire/embers. Sometimes with the glowing amber on a 2.5 long exposure the glowing tent so bright where can see the sticking and from the Amber's all the trees in the photo could be seen perfectly with a fire orange cast to them. Minolta x-700 28mm 2.8 lense Kodac 100 asa/codak 64 slide film. There abouts give little take little should get you in the ballpark. Tripod with weights added. Shutter cable with lock & release button 2-3-4 hrs for exposure Make sure you cover your view window so no light gets in and spoil your negative. If you shoot film have fun with it. My last one was early 2000s trinity alps ca. I just purchased my first camera a77ii digital camera. Trying to learn how to do it all over again on this wonderful sight.
Hmmm I was under the impression that if you have a wide open aperture you would get a very shallow depth of field. How come you can set your focus to the tent and the stars are still sharp?
Would be awesome to see this done with a tipi! Very kewl, i was looking at time lapse videos of the stars with my daughter and this came up on suggested videos after we watched a couple of time lapse videos. Now i know how those awesome shots are made. Thanks!
Additional question is, how are the stars so sharp with a 30 second exposure and no star tracker mount? I've never done a 30 second star exposure without them turning into tiny little streaks just from their movement across the sky.
To decrease the little streaks choose a shorter focus length (he uses also fullframe) and another point is the scale of the image. If you zoom in on this picture the stars are also little streaks.
Unfortunately I don't have a full frame with my 60D. And the shortest focal length my current lens can do is 18mm (28.8mm equivalent at the 1.6x crop factor).
Yes, it can be very difficult. The 'rule' is 500/ (FF)focus length is your exposure time. If you don't want to see the little streaks the only thing you can do without extra costs is to rescale to a smaller image.
Just getting into night sky photography. I can't seem to figure out why everyone says you need 1600 ISO or higher. I'm using 15 to 20 second exposures with an ISO of 400 and my camera is telling me that the image is properly exposed. Am I missing something?
+Adam Feigelman With night photography, you don't want to use the camera to tell you that the picture is properly exposed. Just do a few test shots and see how they turn out.
20 seconds is the max exposure length if you want to avoid star trails - so thats the reason for higher ISO's - to doc all you can with that 20 second window.
Carry that giant light with you, or just use a flashlight (which you probably already have) and one of those bulb things that go over it and hang it in the middle of the tent....seems like about 5 pounds of overkill here.
Well it could even be done with smaller sensor sizes such as m4/3. The most important thing is the iso, the shutter speed and fast lens+focal length. Because low iso means lower shutter speed, lower shutter speed leads to stars that stars moving as in star trails photo. So if you want to get a sharp star thats fixed in the sky you gotta crank up the iso from 800-1600, keep the shutter speed below 30s, open up your aperture and use wide angle lens. Hope that helps
The other night i was trying to get a shoot of the milky way , I was at 30s 3.5f and 3200 iso , and I got some really nice shoots of the stars and all but I didn't get the milky way , how can u find the milky way??
use a phone app that will show you when the milky way rises or sets ..even google sky is a basic free one that will let you see where shit is(won't do predictions).. but there are better astro or starcharts out there just look em up on your android play or ios mobile device downloads
to get a picture of the milky way you need to find out where it is on a smartphone app such as sky guide for Apple devices and tellurium for android. after this you can wait or point in the correct direction and use trial and error. if this doesn't work, it will be because the aperture needs to be lower than f3.5 and more like f1.8 ish.
+L . I . A _ M Best time is when there is no moon and away from light pollution also Got the DSLR in Manual Mode? Check your ISO (sensitivity to light) it may be too high, or maybe up your aperture (The quality of light) the lower aperture the more light is allowed in such as f/2.8=a lot of light. f/22=very little light and check your shutter speed (quantity of light) the longer it's open the more light is allowed into the lens. Feel free to message me for me help
Benjamin Howard I also live in the middle of nowhere, I can see the milky way even sometimes.. and 6200 iso is the highest I can go without it getting grainy
I was trying to shoot the night sky and I could not focus on the stars, I could not even see any stars after the shot was taken in the photograph - just blackness... I think I made mistake with the ISO - I set 100 or even 50 once... but I was shooting with 30 seconds exposure so not sure what went wrong... I had totally black surrounding so maybe I need some light? Anyway thanks for this tips will try.
+Piotr Witkowski Depends on what camera you use, but most will expose well with 1600 ISO, 30S exposure, and make sure your lens is on manual focus, and set to infinity. The horizontal symbol on your lens, some might not have it and you'll have to find out which way to set manual focus to infinity.
+Piotr Witkowski Hey man, I know this is late, but I have a tip. You can crank up your iso a lot to see the stars to focus in live view and then once you have your focus turn your iso down. That's how I get my night shots :)
The wider the lens will alllow for longer shutter speeds. F2.8 is not ideal but you should still be able to get some impressive shots if you're shooting in a very dark area
Does anyone know whether the tent is in focus or the stars? because at a fast aperture wouldnt the stars be out of focus if he used the tent as the original focus point?
Looking the final shot, it looked like the tent was a little out of focus, and the stars in focus. I would think you'd want the stars in focus, rather than the foreground, but with a wide open iris, there'd be enough DOF that the tent wouldn't be too out of focus.
Septimus I never thought of that. I should have done that last weekend when I tried this. I ended up with the tent out of focus and the sky way too bright. Probably should have waited til later, too. Live and learn!
Live and learn man, that's thes spirit. My problem is that it's hard to spot / see the Milky Way in the Netherlands. But I do have some shots tho, taken in a different country.
Night photography? ISO 1600? Shooting wide open? Not saying your shooting style is wrong, but it sure is different. If it works for you, go to it. Personally I shoot more at ISO 100 f/8 or f/11 with a long exposure on a tripod to keep the noise down.
Blue Unicorn if you shoot at f1.8 then it should be sharp from about 18m to infinity. also stars move due to earth's rotation so you need to reduce exposure time to about ~25s otherwise the stars would be streaks of light. this is where the high ISO help to bring out the stars while keeping exposure time low
30 sec . f1.4 and iso800. it must be very dark. dont you wish you would go to f2.8 at least? or maybe 60 sec on a 20mm lower iso. thats what im gonna try next when i get a 20mm
+Mariano Rajoy If you were to apply the 600, you'd only get 30 sec exposure on a 20mm lens. Anything above that would cause star trails. At f/2.8 you'd be 2 stops darker so you'd have to either increase the exposure time to 2min or increase the ISO.
F1.4 vs f2.8 the lower number will let in more light. Which is why f1.4 is ideal for night photography. Also since the earth is rotating anything longer than 30 sec you run the risk of star trails making them look blurry. So always set fstop to lowest number first increase shutter speed until you feel comfortable with the amount of trailing of stars (always different depending on camera and focal length) then use iso lastly to get correct exposure.
![[LIVE] : ONE ลุมพินี 88 | คู่เอก "ป้อมเพชร vs อัสลามจอน"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1ZqTVVbMgbo/mqdefault.jpg)
Carrying that light panel for camping! haha
Came to the comments to say the same thing. I get Adorama wants to sell gear but carrying a light panel on a backpacking trip is NOT realistic. I heard using a cell phone light with a diffuser on top works too.
Assuming the camera was placed 14 meters from the tent and focused there, at F 1.4, everything between 6.2 meters and infinity would be in sharp, perfect focus!
I started doing glowing tents in the early 80s I would drop a glow stick in the tent.
Sometimes I could set up for circling stars. Sometimes glowing forest from camp fire/embers.
Sometimes with the glowing amber on a 2.5 long exposure the glowing tent so bright where can see the sticking and from the Amber's all the trees in the photo could be seen perfectly with a fire orange cast to them.
Minolta x-700
28mm 2.8 lense
Kodac 100 asa/codak 64 slide film. There abouts give little take little should get you in the ballpark.
Tripod with weights added.
Shutter cable with lock & release button
2-3-4 hrs for exposure
Make sure you cover your view window so no light gets in and spoil your negative.
If you shoot film have fun with it.
My last one was early 2000s trinity alps ca.
I just purchased my first camera a77ii digital camera.
Trying to learn how to do it all over again on this wonderful sight.
I was thinking the same thing...I wonder if he took two exposures, one focused on the tent and another to infinity then blended them in post.
This helped me take my first photo of the stars! I was so happy to be able to take pictures like that, even on my bridge camera!
Hmmm I was under the impression that if you have a wide open aperture you would get a very shallow depth of field. How come you can set your focus to the tent and the stars are still sharp?
Are they really sharp or they are just dots of light ??
Good tips. Now all I need is $10,000 to buy the equipment he used :)
+nevadaxtube Tamron 15-30 f2.8 = $1,400 + Nikon D7100 = $1,000 + $100 tripod. $2,500 Same results.
Its a composite. For pin sharp stars, you need to be a tad under infinity. To light up the tent, all you need is the tiny LED head light.
This is a product video more than anything else.
Awesome I wish I could post a photo to you I shot around a campfire Love mine. Great video
Amazing picture
Hi Corey, how the tent wasn't overexposed after 30"?
Great video and awesome shots! I'm planning on trying out your techniques this weekend on North Manitou Island in Michigan.
Would be awesome to see this done with a tipi! Very kewl, i was looking at time lapse videos of the stars with my daughter and this came up on suggested videos after we watched a couple of time lapse videos. Now i know how those awesome shots are made. Thanks!
Well.. I jsut figured out my dslr was capable of making midnight look like the middle of the day.
Additional question is, how are the stars so sharp with a 30 second exposure and no star tracker mount? I've never done a 30 second star exposure without them turning into tiny little streaks just from their movement across the sky.
To decrease the little streaks choose a shorter focus length (he uses also fullframe) and another point is the scale of the image. If you zoom in on this picture the stars are also little streaks.
Unfortunately I don't have a full frame with my 60D. And the shortest focal length my current lens can do is 18mm (28.8mm equivalent at the 1.6x crop factor).
Yes, it can be very difficult. The 'rule' is 500/ (FF)focus length is your exposure time. If you don't want to see the little streaks the only thing you can do without extra costs is to rescale to a smaller image.
I'm with Kent. How does that happen? Is the focus on the tent?
As a backpacker. I can't carry all that extra gears. Any suggestion for my light source
Torch?
I was thinking the same. And video about focusing in dark would be interesting
Thanks a lot! :) I plan to do exactly this soon :)
Just getting into night sky photography. I can't seem to figure out why everyone says you need 1600 ISO or higher. I'm using 15 to 20 second exposures with an ISO of 400 and my camera is telling me that the image is properly exposed. Am I missing something?
+Adam Feigelman With night photography, you don't want to use the camera to tell you that the picture is properly exposed. Just do a few test shots and see how they turn out.
20 seconds is the max exposure length if you want to avoid star trails - so thats the reason for higher ISO's - to doc all you can with that 20 second window.
are you in a area with light pollution like a city?
Nice thank you!
Carry that giant light with you, or just use a flashlight (which you probably already have) and one of those bulb things that go over it and hang it in the middle of the tent....seems like about 5 pounds of overkill here.
could this shot be achieved with an aps-c sensor on the D5500? I know the area has to be dark but I can't afford full frame atm
Well it could even be done with smaller sensor sizes such as m4/3. The most important thing is the iso, the shutter speed and fast lens+focal length. Because low iso means lower shutter speed, lower shutter speed leads to stars that stars moving as in star trails photo. So if you want to get a sharp star thats fixed in the sky you gotta crank up the iso from 800-1600, keep the shutter speed below 30s, open up your aperture and use wide angle lens. Hope that helps
The other night i was trying to get a shoot of the milky way , I was at 30s 3.5f and 3200 iso , and I got some really nice shoots of the stars and all but I didn't get the milky way , how can u find the milky way??
use a phone app that will show you when the milky way rises or sets ..even google sky is a basic free one that will let you see where shit is(won't do predictions).. but there are better astro or starcharts out there just look em up on your android play or ios mobile device downloads
to get a picture of the milky way you need to find out where it is on a smartphone app such as sky guide for Apple devices and tellurium for android. after this you can wait or point in the correct direction and use trial and error. if this doesn't work, it will be because the aperture needs to be lower than f3.5 and more like f1.8 ish.
There apps to help you.
Hector Jaime-Hernandez go to a very dark site at clear summer night
How do you make the forground dark still?? for me its all lit up :(.
+L . I . A _ M Best time is when there is no moon and away from light pollution also Got the DSLR in Manual Mode? Check your ISO (sensitivity to light) it may be too high, or maybe up your aperture (The quality of light) the lower aperture the more light is allowed in such as f/2.8=a lot of light. f/22=very little light and check your shutter speed (quantity of light) the longer it's open the more light is allowed into the lens. Feel free to message me for me help
Benjamin Howard It was my iso :3. I got a d3300 and when I turned the iso down to 400 the photo's turned out great :3. Thanks !
glad you got it figured out. Auto ISO sucks. Always go lowest iso you can and still achieve good exposure. High ISO results in "noise"
Benjamin Howard I also live in the middle of nowhere, I can see the milky way even sometimes.. and 6200 iso is the highest I can go without it getting grainy
Kellen S I figured out that it was the moon light and the light from my house.
I was trying to shoot the night sky and I could not focus on the stars, I could not even see any stars after the shot was taken in the photograph - just blackness... I think I made mistake with the ISO - I set 100 or even 50 once... but I was shooting with 30 seconds exposure so not sure what went wrong... I had totally black surrounding so maybe I need some light? Anyway thanks for this tips will try.
iso should be at 3200, it's gotta be bright bud
+Piotr Witkowski
Depends on what camera you use, but most will expose well with 1600 ISO, 30S exposure, and make sure your lens is on manual focus, and set to infinity. The horizontal symbol on your lens, some might not have it and you'll have to find out which way to set manual focus to infinity.
+Piotr Witkowski Hey man, I know this is late, but I have a tip. You can crank up your iso a lot to see the stars to focus in live view and then once you have your focus turn your iso down. That's how I get my night shots :)
do you need a full frame camera for star photos?
+Bill Baker No, you need a fast lens mostly to get the most.
+Havok is a 2.8 fast enough? I got a tamron 15-30 f/2.8 on a nikon d750
+BigDaddyF FromtheFtotheU Definitely! Great lens.
The wider the lens will alllow for longer shutter speeds. F2.8 is not ideal but you should still be able to get some impressive shots if you're shooting in a very dark area
I want to understand that too!
Great video. . .but I'm not bringing a behemoth of a light with me camping just to light up my tent for a photo. :P
Focus on the tent?
Helps if youre somewhere where you can see the milky way
The tent... your 30 second exposure time allows you to get the stars
Does anyone know whether the tent is in focus or the stars? because at a fast aperture wouldnt the stars be out of focus if he used the tent as the original focus point?
Looking the final shot, it looked like the tent was a little out of focus, and the stars in focus. I would think you'd want the stars in focus, rather than the foreground, but with a wide open iris, there'd be enough DOF that the tent wouldn't be too out of focus.
can also be 2 pics blended. And if it's a ultra wide lens, from a certain distance everything will be in focus.
Septimus
I never thought of that. I should have done that last weekend when I tried this. I ended up with the tent out of focus and the sky way too bright. Probably should have waited til later, too. Live and learn!
Live and learn man, that's thes spirit. My problem is that it's hard to spot / see the Milky Way in the Netherlands. But I do have some shots tho, taken in a different country.
It's hard in the eastern US, too. I could see it, but I wasn't able to capture it.
No details about actual stuff....how he focused stars? There were two exposures or only one.. gist is missing...
Hi, you don't see much movement on stars if you are doing only 30 sec of exposure.
+Joseph Kwong That's not entirely true. You'd have to take focal length into account as well.
Night photography? ISO 1600? Shooting wide open? Not saying your shooting style is wrong, but it sure is different. If it works for you, go to it. Personally I shoot more at ISO 100 f/8 or f/11 with a long exposure on a tripod to keep the noise down.
Blue Unicorn if you shoot at f1.8 then it should be sharp from about 18m to infinity. also stars move due to earth's rotation so you need to reduce exposure time to about ~25s otherwise the stars would be streaks of light. this is where the high ISO help to bring out the stars while keeping exposure time low
30 sec . f1.4 and iso800. it must be very dark. dont you wish you would go to f2.8 at least? or maybe 60 sec on a 20mm lower iso. thats what im gonna try next when i get a 20mm
+Mariano Rajoy If you were to apply the 600, you'd only get 30 sec exposure on a 20mm lens. Anything above that would cause star trails. At f/2.8 you'd be 2 stops darker so you'd have to either increase the exposure time to 2min or increase the ISO.
F1.4 vs f2.8 the lower number will let in more light. Which is why f1.4 is ideal for night photography. Also since the earth is rotating anything longer than 30 sec you run the risk of star trails making them look blurry. So always set fstop to lowest number first increase shutter speed until you feel comfortable with the amount of trailing of stars (always different depending on camera and focal length) then use iso lastly to get correct exposure.