Podcast - Single Image Milky Way Photography vs. Star Tracking

PODCAST Episode 76: Single Image Milky Way Photography vs. Star Tracking. Listen to a podcast I did earlier this week with Aaron and Brendon at Photog Adventures.

Has Star Tracking made Single Image Milky Way Photography just a waste of time? The answer is NO! In this podcast I discuss pros and cons of both types of Milky Way Photography and how to best take advantage of your time out there under the stars —how to get the most out of our images whether or not you do any star tracking.

We share some post-processing techniques I use to reduce the noise in my single image photography, using special DFine tool methods within the Nik Collections, as well as going for the small effort of a mini stack to reduce noise.

I also talk about why I sometimes use an astro-modified camera and the benefits that come from that, as well as the rule of thumb I like to follow for what determines whether an image becomes a Single, Stacked, Blend or Tracked mage. Along with this, I give my thoughts on the ethics of composite nightscape photography.

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Popular Links: How to Shoot the Milky Way • Post Processing NightScapes • Workshops and PhotoWalks • Tutorials and Tips • Overcoming Lens Coma • Video Hangout with my Friends

Sequator is a PC Star Stacking App Alternative to Starry Landscape Stacker

"Bonsai Rock Under The Stars" is a 5-image stack with Sequator to reduce noise in the sky  ~ © Michael Ver Sprill‎ (this is a cropped version - original can be seen on the NightScaper Facebook group)

Sequator is a free Windows / PC software which can track stars on multiple images, align stars and stack them. According to Michael Ver Sprill, it is the first PC software he has found that favorably compares to Starry Landscape Stacker for the Mac!

“I typically use my iMac for editing stacked images and a program called Starry Landscape Stacker which really helps reduce noise and maintain sharpness. However it is for Apple computers only until I came across SEQUATOR. This program is very similar to SLS. The results were practically identical and this seems to be a great alternative for PC users,” says Mike.

“This program is very similar to SLS. The results were practically identical and this seems to be a great alternative for PC users.”

Video Tutorial: Mike has put together a YouTube tutorial that will help you properly install and use Sequator.



Sequator vs. Fitswork: Ralf Rohner has done a nice job comparing Sequator with Fitswork, another popular Windows based star stacking program. He highly recommends Sequator to process an untracked image sequence. "On Windows, it is by far the easiest to use and fastest stacking software for nightscapes and produces very good results. Even beginners can immediately produce excellent results. There are no excuses anymore for noisy single shot nightsapes," says Ralf.

Ralf found Sequator “...really easy to use and it took me less than 5 minutes to produce the result, while my normal workflow in Fitswork takes about 3 hours to arrive at the same stage…The only point where I disagree Mike, is that for better sharpness and less no burned highlights, I recommend to use HDR instead of Auto Brightness.”

For a more detailed comparison, refer to Ralf's Flickr post ~ © Ralf Rohner

Popular Links: How to Shoot the Milky Way • Post Processing NightScapes • Workshops and PhotoWalks • Tutorials and Tips • Overcoming Lens Coma • Video Hangout with my Friends

POTW: 'Milky Way' by Andrey Shumilin

 "Milky Way" by Andrey Shumilin (click on image to enlarge)

Our Photo of the Week (POTW) was taken by Russian photographer, Andrey Shumilin. Andrey used a Nikon D700 with a Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8, zoomed to 14mm. His base exposure for the sky was f/2.8 for 30 seconds @ ISO 3200, and three bracketed exposures for the ground, using an ISO of 200. The foreground was also enhanced with the use of an LED flashlight. All exposures were done with the camera on a stationary tripod.

Technique: (The following was translated from Russian to English, so please bear with us.) Andrey stacked the 12 sky shots by layers in Photoshop. He then applied Auto-alignment to the stars. (The ground objects were temporarily closed off with the use of an unsharp mask, otherwise the alignment will occur on ground objects, and not by the stars.)

Blending mode of the second from the bottom layer was changed to Screen, and merged down. Similarly, pairwise other layers have been processed. As a result, [he] got six brighter layers where the stars were coincide. [The] next step — setting layer's Opacity: the bottom layer - Opacity 100%, second from the bottom - 50%, the next one - 33%, then 25%, 20%, and the top layer - 16%. Then the layers were merged. The ground was then added the final image from three bracketed shots.

Satisfaction: "As a result, I got a picture with virtually no noise," says Andrey". "It allowed [me to] greatly increase the saturation and contrast without [a] catastrophic increase in the noise level."

More of Andrey Shumilin's photography can be seen at his 1x website.

POTW: 'Something Different' by Dan Barr

"Something Different" ~ © Dan Barr (click on image for a larger view)

This unique star trails photograph was taken in Culp Valley within Anza Borrego Desert State Park. (Culp Valley is about 12 miles west of Borrego Springs off of the State Highway S22 and is accessible by a 4WD road.) Dan Barr captured this image with his Canon 40D, using a Tokina 11-16 f/2.8 lens (additional EXIF: focal length was 11mm, 30 second exposures at f/2.8, ISO 1600). This is a "stacked" star trail. Dan used 135 individual exposures to make a composite in Photoshop.

Technique: Barr decided to try a new processing technique for this star trail. He usually assembles his star trails in Photoshop by opening all the images as a layered document and changing the blending mode of each layer to "lighten" to create the trails. This time he thought it would be fun to try to make tapering trails to give the star trails a meteor-like effect. He made the tapering trails by varying the opacity of each layer in Photoshop.

The "tapering trails" idea became somewhat of a pain in the neck! Dan changed the opacity in 5% increments so there was roughly seven images for each increment descending from 100% to 0% opacity. It involved considerable trial and error to get a degree of taper he was finally happy with. Finally, to top it off he increased the exposure and contrast of the first exposure in the star trail stack to accentuate the stars and create kind of a cap for the fading star trails. The resulting image was very different from any of his previous star trails, and he had a lot of fun trying something new.

The light painting was completely by accident! "I was fumbling with my keys and accidentally pushed the unlock button on my car remote," says Barr. "The sidelights and interior lights came on briefly and illuminated the boulders. I usually don't worry to much about stray light in my star trails since I can usually mask it out when I am assembling the image in Photoshop. In this case I liked the the effect from the car lights, so I left it in."

Challenges : "For me the biggest challenges in taking this photo were compositional and in post-processing to assemble the final image," said Dan.

After taking many star trails he has learned that he likes to try to include some of the landscape into the shot in addition to the foreground elements to give the final photo a feeling of depth. Dan wasn't happy with the topography of the surrounding landscape so he just decided to fill the bottom half of the frame with boulders. Still, he was worried that he was going to end up with a boring two-dimensional photo.

Satisfaction: "When I actually got home and started assembling the image, I was pleasantly surprised. The light from my vehicle provided some dimensionality to boulders, and I was pleased with the overall framing," reports Barr.

More of Dan Barr's photography can be seen at his Flickr photostream and his website.