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Posted: 12/11/2016 9:58:44 PM EDT
[#1]
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Posted: 12/12/2016 6:56:00 AM EDT
[#2]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
https://www.AR15.Com/media/mediaFiles/156207/CJM-0563-s-105607.JPG Single image. Got a comet up on the north shore on Lake Superior. I really like that |
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Posted: 12/14/2016 9:36:08 AM EDT
[#3]
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Posted: 12/14/2016 2:06:46 PM EDT
[#4]
Wow
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Posted: 12/14/2016 7:43:50 PM EDT
[#5]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Wow This. I love how the green of the aurora pops out. |
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Posted: 12/14/2016 10:08:26 PM EDT
[#6]
Awesome. EXIF?
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Posted: 12/19/2016 1:39:17 AM EDT
[#7]
So I realize I still don't have the right lens for this, but I'm giving it a go
 Question though. What would make a meteor/satellite star trail be a lumpy line? Check out the top of this one at full resolution. (see link)
full resolution 
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Posted: 12/19/2016 9:35:32 AM EDT
[#8]
Might be rotating and hitting the sun differently as it does.
You can see this happen if you watch satellites as they go overhead, sometimes you will get an Iridium flare when the sun hits it just right and it will briefly shine very bright. Doesn't always happen and I'm not even saying that is what happened in your pic, but its a possibility |
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Posted: 12/19/2016 6:06:21 PM EDT
[#9]
everyone in my house is fighting a bug right now, but its clear outside for the first time in weeks, unless something goes very wrong I'm going to try and do some shots. I'm already got most of my stuff setup.
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Posted: 12/19/2016 6:23:16 PM EDT
[#10]
Great thread, love the shots..
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Posted: 12/19/2016 9:30:13 PM EDT
[#11]
So, do you guys think it would be better to use my 18-55 f/3.5-5.6 kit lens and a much longer exposure? I do that for aurora, but haven't tried it for stars.
I will admit I am tempted to use my 70-300 and a long exposure to try to zoom in a bit since I don't have a telescope I can use. |
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:00:27 PM EDT
[#12]
NP, that "lumpyness" might be to the meteor flaring as it traveled through the atmosphere. Meteors are lit by their own fire, not the sun.
As far as lenses for big-sky night shots, I use either the 11-16, the 24-120 (at 24), or the 35 prime. I want the sharpness I get with the 35 but the focal length of the 11. Plus, the 35 if f/1.8, the 11-16 is f/2.8, and the 24-120 is f/4. This is the 11-16 at 11mm, f/2.8, 94 seconds, ISO100. I usually do night exposures with the intervalometer and then stack 'em, but wanted to try an ISS transit in one shot. Clouds screwed me over (that's a plane that's making the line).  CloudStream by FredMan, on Flickr
This one is 11mm, 20 sec, F/2.8, ISO400  DSC_3657-Melk Weg by FredMan, on Flickr
How long an exposure are you talking about? This is 240 15-second frames.  StarTrails Stack 11mm 2016-03-15a by FredMan, on Flickr
And I think this one was 140-ish 10-second frames stacked.  Firefly 160527 by FredMan, on Flickr
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:10:15 PM EDT
[#13]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
NP, that "lumpyness" might be to the meteor flaring as it traveled through the atmosphere. Meteors are lit by their own fire, not the sun. As far as lenses for big-sky night shots, I use either the 11-16, the 24-120 (at 24), or the 35 prime. I want the sharpness I get with the 35 but the focal length of the 11. Plus, the 35 if f/1.8, the 11-16 is f/2.8, and the 24-120 is f/4. This is the 11-16 at 11mm, f/2.8, 94 seconds, ISO100. I usually do night exposures with the intervalometer and then stack 'em, but wanted to try an ISS transit in one shot. Clouds screwed me over (that's a plane that's making the line). CloudStream by FredMan, on Flickr Neat shot  And that makes sense. If I had the budget for another lens, I'd buy the 35mm or something wider in a heartbeat. Just kinda stuck on a $0 budget at the moment.
I just caught the 94 second exposure though. Damn.
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:20:05 PM EDT
[#14]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Neat shot And that makes sense. If I had the budget for another lens, I'd buy the 35mm or something wider in a heartbeat. Just kinda stuck on a $0 budget at the moment.
I just caught the 94 second exposure though. Damn. At the risk of being called a cheater, thought I'd upload that frame as shot. Lightroom edits were playing around with exposure, temp, clarity, vibrance, saturation, tone curves, and sharpness. Plus some moderate cropping. Just shows what shooting raw and some judicious editing can do for dramatic presence in a photo.  CloudStream by FredMan, on Flickr
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:44:31 PM EDT
[#15]
finally got my clear night. I'm surrounded by trees, light pollution is pretty bad too but it was night
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:49:36 PM EDT
[#16]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
finally got my clear night. I'm surrounded by trees, light pollution is pretty bad too but it was night http://i.imgur.com/GO3NDuo.jpg Jelly. If I had a drive I'd never come inside after dark. |
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Posted: 12/19/2016 10:59:43 PM EDT
[#17]
I'll post pics up once I work on them, my damn guide scope wouldn't work, so I wasn't getting as long of exposures as I wanted without star trails.
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Posted: 12/19/2016 11:10:23 PM EDT
[#18]
The biggest problem I have is not having the time to learn how to properly use all this gear I have. I can watch a million videos on cloudy nights but when I only get a night here or there to really play its hard to remember it all.
Anyways I'll post up my pics even if they suck I shot Orion Nebula, the Flame Nebula, M31, M33 and Uranus Part of the reason I shot so much instead of focusing on one target was because of the damn trees, I only had a short window to shoot each one |
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Posted: 12/19/2016 11:26:59 PM EDT
[#19]
quick one, the Triangulum Galaxy
I'll mess with the processing later this week, this was just a quick tweak of levels in photoshop 
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Posted: 12/19/2016 11:31:04 PM EDT
[#20]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
quick one, the Triangulum Galaxy I'll mess with the processing later this week, this was just a quick tweak of levels in photoshop http://i.imgur.com/AOBuzzn.jpg Dude
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Posted: 12/19/2016 11:49:05 PM EDT
[#21]
Andromeda
I bet I can tease out some more detail. 
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Posted: 12/20/2016 12:05:18 AM EDT
[#22]
great pics
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Posted: 12/20/2016 12:11:34 AM EDT
[#23]
ok, last one for tonight. I should be able to make something half way decent out of what i took tonight. Honestly though more exposure time is always needed. Most guys have hours of exposures into a single image, these are only 4-10 minutes
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Posted: 12/20/2016 12:18:34 AM EDT
[#24]
Thank you for posting this. I was quite the astronomer when I was a kid with my little reflector. It was cool staying up all night viewing the skies and writing notes on my observations. Thanks for bringing it back.
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Posted: 12/20/2016 11:02:03 AM EDT
[#25]
had a few minutes to play today at work, so I tweaked M33 a bit more
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Posted: 12/20/2016 7:34:27 PM EDT
[#26]
Ciraxis, those are amazing. Are those single frames or are you stacking multiples?
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Posted: 12/20/2016 9:13:40 PM EDT
[#27]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Ciraxis, those are amazing. Are those single frames or are you stacking multiples? thanks. I still have a ton to improve upon, mainly in how well I can get the tracking going on my mount. each "shot" is stacked. Andromeda and M33 are both about 50 shots, all with short exposures between 10-30 seconds. when the tracking is refinded on my mount I'll be looking to get at least 1-3 minutes, 10+ if my guide scope is tracking well. So yeah I still have much to improve. I imagine I'll get into stacking hundreds of shots in the near future. Last night was mostly a play night, I wasn't going to fuss too much |
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Posted: 12/22/2016 8:01:46 AM EDT
[#28]
Beautiful pics guys. I have zero skill, and limited equipment, when it comes to this stuff. Someday....
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Posted: 12/22/2016 9:40:04 AM EDT
[#29]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Beautiful pics guys. I have zero skill, and limited equipment, when it comes to this stuff. Someday.... all you need is a camera and a tripod to get started. 
you can take wide field shots of the galaxy, shots of the ISS as it passes over or star trails. 
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Posted: 12/22/2016 10:17:35 AM EDT
[#30]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
NP, that "lumpyness" might be to the meteor flaring as it traveled through the atmosphere. Meteors are lit by their own fire, not the sun. As far as lenses for big-sky night shots, I use either the 11-16, the 24-120 (at 24), or the 35 prime. I want the sharpness I get with the 35 but the focal length of the 11. Plus, the 35 if f/1.8, the 11-16 is f/2.8, and the 24-120 is f/4. This is the 11-16 at 11mm, f/2.8, 94 seconds, ISO100. I usually do night exposures with the intervalometer and then stack 'em, but wanted to try an ISS transit in one shot. Clouds screwed me over (that's a plane that's making the line). CloudStream by FredMan, on Flickr This one is 11mm, 20 sec, F/2.8, ISO400 DSC_3657-Melk Weg by FredMan, on Flickr How long an exposure are you talking about? This is 240 15-second frames. StarTrails Stack 11mm 2016-03-15a by FredMan, on Flickr And I think this one was 140-ish 10-second frames stacked. Firefly 160527 by FredMan, on Flickr Hey FredMan, what part of Va are you taking these? What is the light pollution like there? Are these all with a 11-16 Tokina? I have that lens. Love it. |
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Posted: 12/22/2016 10:59:42 AM EDT
[#31]
I may have already posted this but this website
http://www.jshine.net/astronomy/dark_sky/ is great for finding a dark site for observing or doing photos. There is a great app too |
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Posted: 12/22/2016 11:32:39 AM EDT
[#32]
Thanks, I,ve used that site. I was just wondering where in Va , since I live in the state also.
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Posted: 12/22/2016 11:56:09 AM EDT
[#33]
Ok I'm going to post a quick run down of how I process images. I'll use some old files I have of M81, M82 & NGC3077
First things first is I gather up all the images from a session that I want to stack together 
Basically the more images you have the better, at various ISO and exposure times. All the noise starts to even out the more shots you have, for this test I have 39 shots, and that is not nearly enough. 100-400 would probably be better This is what a single shot looks like, noisy as hell with little detail, but you can make out the three galaxies 
You can use photoshop to stack images but thats tedious so I use a free program Lynkeos, only because it works on a mac, I would prefer to use Deep Sky Stacker but I have installed parallels yet on my computer Basically the software aligns and stacks your images, so you get something like this, still lackluster but a lot of noise has been smoothed out 
This is where we start in photoshop. I would prefer not to use photoshop, but I don't have the coin to drop on astro software like pixinsight of nebulosity to process these photos. 
first I set a black pint near the edge 
then tweak the curve 
hit ok then do it again. another black point and a smaller less extreme push on the curves. Now its starting to get somewhere 
Thats all I have time for right now, have to head out on a shoot. |
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Posted: 12/22/2016 8:56:55 PM EDT
[#34]
I put in the order today for the 24mm rokinon. Got 7 days free from lensrentals, so I'll have it tomorrow through 1/3 for $70. Now clouds should move in permanently.
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Posted: 12/26/2016 9:46:30 AM EDT
[#35]
the Pleiades from last night, also known as the Seven Sisters or M45
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Posted: 12/26/2016 9:59:12 AM EDT
[#36]
this is a stack of shots I took of andromeda last night, now I need to do the tedious process of aligning them with the other shots I've done, to hopefully produce a nicer image
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Posted: 12/26/2016 1:05:14 PM EDT
[#37]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
this is a stack of shots I took of andromeda last night, now I need to do the tedious process of aligning them with the other shots I've done, to hopefully produce a nicer image http://i.imgur.com/5PH0Cpn.jpg Wow 
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Posted: 12/26/2016 1:39:58 PM EDT
[#38]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
I put in the order today for the 24mm rokinon. Got 7 days free from lensrentals, so I'll have it tomorrow through 1/3 for $70. Now clouds should move in permanently. Did you have a chance to play with that lens yet? |
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Posted: 12/26/2016 1:40:54 PM EDT
[#39]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Wow Thanks! Hopefully once i combine it with the other shots i can produce a finer result |
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Posted: 12/26/2016 10:31:55 PM EDT
[#40]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Did you have a chance to play with that lens yet? Quote HistoryQuoted:
Quoted:
I put in the order today for the 24mm rokinon. Got 7 days free from lensrentals, so I'll have it tomorrow through 1/3 for $70. Now clouds should move in permanently. Did you have a chance to play with that lens yet? Been so cloudy/foggy. Tomorrow is Clear and above average, I am packing up everything and shooting from astronomical twilight until i pass out. This is the best so far, this was Christmas evening. 50-60 degrees and dead calm fog fog fog.  _DSC3608-Edit by sseagle, on Flickr
ETA: The only issue so far is the 'Depth of Field band' on the one I got sent is rotating freely, I guess its good I don't really look at it, and I let them know so hopefully I am not buying this example lol. |
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Posted: 12/28/2016 1:42:05 AM EDT
[#41]
Just got back from my sixish hours of driving, I did manage a nap while the intervalometer worked, but I am beat and real processing/stacking is going to have to wait, I have a breakfast date with my parents.
Quick messy edit.  _DSC3658 by sseagle, on Flickr
Straight out of the camera, just converted.  _DSC3659 by sseagle, on Flickr
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Posted: 12/28/2016 9:09:58 AM EDT
[#42]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Just got back from my sixish hours of driving, I did manage a nap while the intervalometer worked, but I am beat and real processing/stacking is going to have to wait, I have a breakfast date with my parents. Quick messy edit. _DSC3658 by sseagle, on Flickr Straight out of the camera, just converted. _DSC3659 by sseagle, on Flickr nice
I bet you can pull all kinds of detail out of that second photo. If you have a series of shots of that region of sky you'll be able to stack them and smooth out any noise |
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Posted: 12/28/2016 1:53:22 PM EDT
[#43]
still working with these images. The color gets a bit funky when I upload it but you get the idea. I still need much better tracking and more exposures to get where I want this image to go
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Posted: 12/28/2016 7:35:04 PM EDT
[#44]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
nice
I bet you can pull all kinds of detail out of that second photo. If you have a series of shots of that region of sky you'll be able to stack them and smooth out any noise Yeah I stacked 42 of the 57 of a region around Pleiades earlier and I was going to work on it more during the hockey game. |
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Posted: 12/28/2016 9:58:44 PM EDT
[#45]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Thanks, I,ve used that site. I was just wondering where in Va , since I live in the state also. Louisa County, out in the country. One "trick" I use for my startrails shots is to take a bunch of short-exposure (10-15 second) shots and stack them with StarTrails. That preserves the "darkness" of the night sky and still gives you nice bright trails. Yes, most are with the Tokina 11-16. This is a 244-second single exposure of the ISS transit. See how "light" the night sky is?  ISS Transit 2016-10-17 by FredMan, on Flickr
This is probably 20 10-second exposures, stacked. See how nice and dark the sky is?  ISS Transit 20121201 Depart by FredMan, on Flickr
I do have to cheat a bit; I go back with GIMP and fill in the gaps from the camera cycling between frames. Here's what it looks like without that work:  ISS Stack 2016-10-16_01 by FredMan, on Flickr
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Posted: 12/29/2016 7:14:36 AM EDT
[#46]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
Yeah I stacked 42 of the 57 of a region around Pleiades earlier and I was going to work on it more during the hockey game. What did you use to stack them? If you are on windows try Deep Sky Stacker, if using a mac try Lynkeos. You can use photoshop but man it's tedious |
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Posted: 12/29/2016 11:42:21 AM EDT
[#47]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
What did you use to stack them? If you are on windows try Deep Sky Stacker, if using a mac try Lynkeos. You can use photoshop but man it's tedious Yeah deep sky stacker, it came out interesting but my pixinsight apparently did not save the file so I need to start over. |
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Posted: 12/29/2016 12:02:07 PM EDT
[#48]
I really need to buy pixinsight, it will be awhile before I can buy it though, fucking cancer nuked our bank account
Do you like it? I have been playing with Nebulosity demo but it crashes constantly, I'm using it on my studio computer too which is a decent computer |
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Posted: 12/29/2016 12:14:50 PM EDT
[#49]
Quote HistoryQuoted:
I really need to buy pixinsight, it will be awhile before I can buy it though, fucking cancer nuked our bank account
Do you like it? I have been playing with Nebulosity demo but it crashes constantly, I'm using it on my studio computer too which is a decent computer I don't understand it, I'm working with someone elses workflow and eeking out results. I fear I can no longer learn. Between the stacker and pixinsight, I use all eight of my cores doing things and all of my 32g of ram, its wonderful.  Autosave_ABE_DBE by sseagle, on Flickr
Here is the first sweep at my stack. |
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Posted: 12/29/2016 7:38:52 PM EDT
[#50]
working on some shots I took of Orion nebula on christmas
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