Star Trails

[Ridn9high]

Last night I got out to give myself another try at shooting "Star Trails". As I was taking the photo's, I noticed in one picture that the front of an old tractor really stood out. So for the rest of the night I used the tractor in the pictures. Here are 3 different shots, one is around 8 minutes, another is 20 and the last is 60 minutes.

 

[Kit Fox]

Cool Experiment. Digital sensors get real noisy when you take really long shots. I've read where pro stair trail photographers, take hundreds or thousands of 30 second shots, then stack the shots using imaging stacking software, or the latest versions of photoshop. This reduces the noise.

My future goal is to do a time-lapse with night photographs. I don't have a computer that can handle the processing power needed to render the videos, from still images yet.

 

[Ridn9high]

I think once I get my other lens, I'm going to try the multi shot star trail. I'm like you though, I need another PC to do the image work on. I'm in the process of getting a new PC and editing software for both hobby and side job(portaits). I'm really wanting to learn HDR photography. Those photos turn out amazing.

 

[Kit Fox]

I think once I get my other lens, I'm going to try the multi shot star trail. I'm like you though, I need another PC to do the image work on. I'm in the process of getting a new PC and editing software for both hobby and side job(portaits). I'm really wanting to learn HDR photography. Those photos turn out amazing.

HDR can be cool, and most of the time, it is a dead giveaway. Way too many photographers produce cartoonish results. http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-create-an-hdr-image

Here are a few HDR examples I took. I learned how to make improvements, and make them more realistic.

BAD:

Lone-Pine-Creek-Falls by sgbofav, on Flickr


DSC_4254TMFinal by sgbofav, on Flickr

Much Better:




Instead of HDRs, learn the secrets of hand blending multiple exposures, for more realistic looking images: