Night Sky

Richard,
It takes a bit to get a handle of shooting night photos and this looks pretty good.
I don't do it enough but get better ever time I shoot so that is the key.
You are getting star movement, I would cut down the time to 20-25 sec, with a 17mm lens and up the ISO to compensate.
Exposure time adds as much noise as ISO, you can shoot shorter, have higher ISO and still have less noise.
It has some noise, I use Topaz de noise and I have found it does the best job of NR without a lot of sharpness loss.
You have enough light for the FG, it looks like you had a bit of moonlight?
A bit more would be better for me.
I used to go on moonless nights but have found a quarter moon behind you works much better. You still get stars (not a full blown milky way) and enough light that the photos are not too dark and the FG is lit up.
Hope this is somewhat helpful, you look like you know what you are doing....

I wish I could help, Richard. My wife loves the milky way shots posted here on NPN and wants me to do more night work. I like what you've got here and I think Dan gave you some great advice that dovetails with what I have read. I think you are will on your way.

After reading Dan's comment, I think he gave you good advice. I have never seriously tried night photography, at least not digital. There is nowhere around here where the city lights pretty much drown out the stars. I think you did fairly well here, but I can see the noise on the ground and the star movement.

Well, I have not done much night photography, but I know what I like; and I like this.
One of the reasons I like it is because it actually looks like night! From what I have seen, there are two kinds of night images created by photographers that easily stand apart:
1. Realistic Night Photographs. These are representations of nature as it exists in the real world, where a night scene looks like night time, i.e., dark.
2. Fantasy Night Artwork based on photographs. These are either composites of exposures made during different time periods, or single images where exposure levels of parts of the scene are highly manipulated. (Light painting is somewhere between these two kinds of images.) The results are images that do not -- and usually cannot -- exist in nature, where stars shine intensely in bright skies, and the landscape resembles the twilight period, long before stars would be plainly visible.

I actually enjoy both kinds of images, but I tend to have a greater appreciation of those that represent nature instead of impossible fantasy. To me, your image falls into that nature photography category, rather than the fantasy artwork.

Richard, this looks very good. I like the clouds sweeping off the prow of the ridge and all of the stars above the ridge. Yes, there's a bit of movement in the stars, but it's small enough not to be important. My only nit is that the foreground seems slightly reduced in contrast, there's a greyness there doesn't "feel" quit right, but could very well be real due to the moonlight.

First of all, I like what you've done. It's an interesting landscape and I like the wispy clouds with the stars shining through. Is the bright "star" Venus? This is an area, I too, would like to pursue. What I know is from reading. A 17 mm lens on the 7D is equivalent to a 27 mm lens given the crop factor and from my reading the maximum time is about 22 seconds to avoid star trails. If you have time you can do in camera noise reduction (Custom Function II-long exposure noise reduction). This takes an additional 22 seconds or whatever your original time was. The book "Photography Night Sky" by Jennifer Wu is full of information and probably quite helpful. Good luck and keep them coming.

Sorry, can't offer much cause I don't do these much either. I think it looks pretty good. Seems like 30 seconds is just too long to get crisp points of light. Higher iso would capture even more stars too.

Chris

I rarely do this either but this strikes me as a very good attempt Richard and a lot to glean from the comments. Your location seems to be ideal for further experimentation.

Hi Richard Wayne's comments echoed my thoughts perfectly. very good work here


Albert Darmo
Canada