windhund116

Great photo! Did you use a Barn Door tracker tripod to take the photo? What exposure?

Thanks!

skunkworks

Thanks Wind! The photo consists of seven exposures stitched together into one. The image was taken in April when the Milky Way can be seen as an arch in the sky. Details: Canon 5D DSLR, ISO 3600, 16MM lens, f2.8, and a Ball Head tripod. Exposure: 30 seconds each.

Heyitsgary

Are the 7 stitches vertical slices put side by side to generate the end results or some other pattern?

I guess I'm not realizing how wide- Would the 16mm (or wider) shooting 1 shot horizontal provide a very similar result?

skunkworks

Thanks for the questions, Gary.

Will a 16mm lens’s image cover approximately 170 degrees? Hmm…I’m not certain. If so, a single horizontal image will cause distortion at its edges. Rather than taking that chance I used several vertical exposures to reduce the distortion by combining them and horizontally cropping the final image. Here’s more…

A long exposure astrophotography image of the night sky using a DSLR camera with a high ISO setting creates substantial noise. There are proven ways to reduce noise of your low-light, long exposure shots, and that is to take several shots of the same area of the night sky and blend them together using a technique called photo stacking. By taking seven vertical overlapped photos it created an ability to stack them in order to reduce noise.

A stacked image will appear smother and create an improved image. There are several software tools that will automatically align and stack your images together, including my personal favorites, DeepSkyStacker and Adobe Lightroom. I’ve used both software packages a great deal with good results. I have recently taken hundreds of Andromeda Galaxy photos and post processed by using both of the software apps and I’m very pleased with their abilities.

Oh, BTW - living in a dark sky, high elevation, and dry climate helps.

Adobe Lightroom was used to create the prairie image.

windhund116

Beautiful shot(s). Gotta try this technique, one clear day out in the desert. I guess being a moonless sky also helps.

Lainey

I've see four different varieties of butterflies in my yard. They are attracted to the flowers in the garden and next year, we will also plant more of the types of flowers which does attract them, and on which they can feed.
Tiger Swallowtail below. We also get the monarchs, the swallowtail (black) and Painted lady. I have a photo friend who is quite knowledgeable on butterflies and she helps with the ID.

buckeyesue

Lainey, that butterfly picture is absolutely stunning! The colors and detail are amazing!

I think that you should definitely frame that one and hang it in your home photo gallery!

Lainey

Thanks, Sue! Maybe I will switch out a photo.

dlq04

Butterflies beat Porsches.

Lainey

The Porsche pics are in the TV room.