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Posted on 19/11/14 6:50:55 PM |
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shaneworth71
Meticulous Montagist Posts: 27 Reply  |
shooting the moon and stars
I am interested in shooting the night sky. I am new to actual photography. What settings do you use for the night sky. Here is a picture of the moon I took with a nikon d5100. 55-200mm lens f/13 shutter 1/500 iso 6400.  |
Posted on 19/11/14 8:46:31 PM |
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GKB
Magical Montagist Posts: 3959 Reply  |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
Hi Shaneworth, Nice image of the moon. Shooting it when it is not full like this is great because you can pick out individual craters at the terminator with those grazing shadows. You don’t actually need to use 6400iso with the moon because it is so bright. High iso numbers can, depending on the camera, lead to a lot of digital noise so it is best to keep the iso down. You might want to use around 400-800 but not too much higher. Because the moon is, effectively, at infinity so far as the camera is concerned, depth of field is not a problem even on a long lens so you can shoot wide open. This allows you to use a fast shutter speed. The reason for the fast shutter speed is movement blur because, although it might not seem like it, that moon is moving across the sky at a fair rate. So a long exposure is just going to end up blurred. Take a few shots with bracketed exposures and see what is best. Experimentation is the word. By all means use autofocus to get the focus right but then change to manual when you have set it. This stops the autofocus hunting when a low contrast part of the moon moves into view; and believe me it will move very quickly. You will probably find that the edge of the moon is best to focus on. Use RAW and the longest lens you can beg, steal or borrow. When shooting star fields or the Milky Way then that’s the time to bump up the iso. Try it in steps going up to 6400iso. Use maximum aperture, again with manual focus at infinity. You can expect exposure times of up to 30 seconds. You will notice a little image movement as the stars trail. Check the sharpness of the image after you have shot it by zooming in on the camera’s screen. Pick a really dark sky. It’s pointless trying to do this with a full moon as it just fills the sky with scattered light from dust particles and water vapour and the stars are wiped out. A dark, cold winter sky with no clouds and no moon is the best time although you can get some really nice sky shots with stars on a summer evening when the sun has just set. Any light from a nearby city or even your neighbour’s back garden will really mess up your picture. Use the widest angle lens you can beg, steal or borrow. This is a great opportunity to dig out that 8mm fish-eye lens but something around 20mm equivalent will do nicely. A solid tripod is essential as is a cable release. I have attached a couple of Youtube videos that you might want to look at. The first goes into some detail about how to shoot the image and the second goes into the processing in Photoshop. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkLaTdfIAv8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOAmP7A_x6c You might also find this useful: http://app.photoephemeris.com The Photographer's Ephemeris gives sunset/sunrise and moonset/moonrise times anywhere in the world and can help in planning shots such as you want. Below is an image that I shot a couple of weeks ago in my village. It’s actually a double exposure as it was not possible to balance the exposures of the floodlit church and the night sky. The lens in this case was a Canon 10-22mm used at the 10mm end giving a 16mm equivalent. Let’s have a look at what you do. 
_________________ It only seems impossible. |
Posted on 28/11/14 09:06:43 AM |
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GKB
Magical Montagist Posts: 3959 Reply |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
? _________________ You're never too old to learn something stupid. |
Posted on 02/12/14 3:24:24 PM |
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shaneworth71
Meticulous Montagist Posts: 27 Reply |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
Thank you Sir, I haven't been on the forums lately. I am hoping for a really good dark night soon to try some of these out. Also have to get my camera back from the shop because I took a recent tumble off a roof with it  |
Posted on 02/12/14 7:03:25 PM |
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GKB
Magical Montagist Posts: 3959 Reply |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
You took a tumble off a roof?????  A man of your age should know better  Hope nothing got broken
_________________ You're never too old to learn something stupid. |
Posted on 02/12/14 9:38:40 PM |
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shaneworth71
Meticulous Montagist Posts: 27 Reply |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
LOL nothing broken just bruised and banged up and learned my nikon can take a pretty good beating. |
Posted on 03/12/14 10:54:55 AM |
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DavidMac
Director of Photoshop Posts: 5527 Reply  |
Re: shooting the moon and stars
I second everything GKB has said. Really excellent advice!!  _________________ The subtlety and conviction of any Photoshop effect is invariably inversely proportional to the number of knobs on it ....... |