Last night was a meteor shower event referred to as "Perseids" because of where it appears to radiate from, the constellation Perseus, whereupon the Earth passes through the dusty remains of the comet Swift-Tuttle. If you missed it, the next event (Orionids) occurs the night of 20 Oct 2012, so get ready!
Post your favorite star/meteor shot in this thread from your album; any space shot you particularly like will do. If you don't have one, challenge yourself to take one; it can be pretty gratifying! Let's generate some interest for the next event in October!
This was mine from last night:
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@abirkill This helps a ton. I am shooting with my Canon 60D with my 18mm at f/3.5 and yes the ISO was much lower than your suggestion. I know this is a crop sensor, but it does do high ISO somewhat well but getting noisy, especially at 12,800.
Tonight I will throw my nifty fifty (50mm f/1.8) on and bump up the ISO to 6400 and see what happens. Now I do lose most of my wider angle, so hopefully I am pointed at the right spot at the right time.
How long can I leave the shutter open at this high of an ISO, or is that going to be trial and error play since it matters on ambient light or light pollution from the city (Seattle), of which I am only about 25 miles outside of?
@trbo I'd probably stick with the 18mm at f/3.5, but at a much higher ISO -- the 50mm will cover a relatively narrow area of sky so it might be a tad frustrating. No harm in trying both though!
I suspect at 6400 ISO on a 60D you'd be best not to exceed 20-30 seconds, more for noise issues rather than light pollution per-se.
Make sure you know about your camera's built-in noise cancellation feature -- you have three settings, On, Auto and Off, and I think Auto is default -- this means that the camera will take a 'dark image' with the shutter closed after your exposure. The idea of this is that it captures any standard noise patterns, which it then subtracts from the image you took. It's a useful feature, but it's confusing if you've never experienced it before, as the camera will appear to 'lock up' after you've taken your shot, for the same duration (i.e. if you do a 30 second exposure, it will then not allow you to do anything for a further 30 seconds afterwards). If it's on Auto, shooting at ISO 6400 for several seconds will almost certainly trigger it.
Also, remember that, from solely the point of view of the meteor, in the same way it doesn't matter how long your exposure is, it also doesn't matter how short your exposure is (within reason). The meteor will be visible generally for a couple of seconds at most, so as long as the shutter is open for those two seconds, you've captured it -- only the aperture and ISO will affect how bright it is. This means that you can balance the background light using the shutter speed -- if you are taking 20 second exposures and the light pollution is too visible or the photo is too noisy, drop it down to 10 seconds. If you find that you want more detail from the stars, then you can increase it to 30 seconds. (This is exactly the same technique used to balance flash light output with ambient light when shooting portraits).
Wow these photos are amazing! @abirkill especially yours is incredible.
I'd never tried to photograph the stars before but I thought I'd give it a go over the meteorite shower. Unfortunately it got really cloudy so visibility was bad and I didn't manage to see any after I started shooting. Any feedback on my photo would be much appreciated, I took @grizzlysghost advice on using a 20second exposure.
@cgarner To the right of your photo there is a "Share" section. There is a box a little lower in this section that mentions "Copy and paste code". Do just that; copy the weird code in that box (quite long) and paste it into a discussion :)
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Tonight I will throw my nifty fifty (50mm f/1.8) on and bump up the ISO to 6400 and see what happens. Now I do lose most of my wider angle, so hopefully I am pointed at the right spot at the right time.
How long can I leave the shutter open at this high of an ISO, or is that going to be trial and error play since it matters on ambient light or light pollution from the city (Seattle), of which I am only about 25 miles outside of?
I suspect at 6400 ISO on a 60D you'd be best not to exceed 20-30 seconds, more for noise issues rather than light pollution per-se.
Make sure you know about your camera's built-in noise cancellation feature -- you have three settings, On, Auto and Off, and I think Auto is default -- this means that the camera will take a 'dark image' with the shutter closed after your exposure. The idea of this is that it captures any standard noise patterns, which it then subtracts from the image you took. It's a useful feature, but it's confusing if you've never experienced it before, as the camera will appear to 'lock up' after you've taken your shot, for the same duration (i.e. if you do a 30 second exposure, it will then not allow you to do anything for a further 30 seconds afterwards). If it's on Auto, shooting at ISO 6400 for several seconds will almost certainly trigger it.
Also, remember that, from solely the point of view of the meteor, in the same way it doesn't matter how long your exposure is, it also doesn't matter how short your exposure is (within reason). The meteor will be visible generally for a couple of seconds at most, so as long as the shutter is open for those two seconds, you've captured it -- only the aperture and ISO will affect how bright it is. This means that you can balance the background light using the shutter speed -- if you are taking 20 second exposures and the light pollution is too visible or the photo is too noisy, drop it down to 10 seconds. If you find that you want more detail from the stars, then you can increase it to 30 seconds. (This is exactly the same technique used to balance flash light output with ambient light when shooting portraits).
I was out early this morning and didn't capture a meteor, but saw lots of them. Here are my trials from this morning:
I'd never tried to photograph the stars before but I thought I'd give it a go over the meteorite shower. Unfortunately it got really cloudy so visibility was bad and I didn't manage to see any after I started shooting. Any feedback on my photo would be much appreciated, I took @grizzlysghost advice on using a 20second exposure.
http://365project.org/cgarner/365/2012-08-12