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Archive 2013 · Into the Heavens

Steve Dublanko
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Into the Heavens

Woke up early with my friend Justin Grimm to try and get a sunrise shot of Pyramid Mountain. Unfortunately there wasn't a cloud in the sky (I think i'm cursed) so we came away empty handed. The forecast for the following day called for more of the same so we decided to hike in early and try to shoot the Milky Way.

No clouds and no wind made for a pretty surreal star gazing morning and a sweet reflection in Pyramid Lake. This is a 2 shot vertical pano taken around 4:30am. Thanks for looking!

C&C always welcome.

500px Link

Sep 03, 2013 at 09:35 PM

Sunny Sra
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Into the Heavens

Steve,
That is very nice. if you can afford a little bit more light on the mountain...i think this would do really well.

Sep 03, 2013 at 09:52 PM

Steve Dublanko
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Into the Heavens

Sunny Sra wrote:
Steve,
That is very nice. if you can afford a little bit more light on the mountain...i think this would do really well.

Thanks Sunny. I really wish I could afford more light on the mountain but I don't think I can spare any more. I spent a good hour trying to salvage some of the shadow detail and even debated silhouetting it but settled on this as a compromise. Unfortunately, I am at the limit of the 6D's sensor. I'm kicking myself for not hanging around long enough to get a twilight shot of the mountain half hour or so before sunrise.... I won't make that mistake again. Either that or switch to Nikon and push the shadows without worry!

Sep 03, 2013 at 10:26 PM

kwilliam8
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Into the Heavens

Steve, nice image - I really like this! The reflection of the stars is nice. The mountain being very dark is not a problem with me. Nice work!
Keith W.

Sep 03, 2013 at 11:17 PM

Brad Williams
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Into the Heavens

Beautiful Photo Steve, I really like it.

Sep 04, 2013 at 07:26 AM

JustinPoe
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Into the Heavens

Really nice Steve! I see you used the Rokinon 14mm? That's such a great lens.

Sep 04, 2013 at 08:18 AM

Steve Dublanko
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Into the Heavens

Thanks guys, appreciate the feedback.

@Justin: Ya, the Roki/Samyang/Bower 14mm is a very underrated lens. I use mine all the time and its perfect for night shots if you can get around the distortion. Its pretty light as well so the 24-105 / 14 combo is excellent for hiking.

Sep 04, 2013 at 12:42 PM

Bastian Bleu
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Into the Heavens

Great shot, Steve. I was just able to take my 1st ever shot of the Milky Way last night and it was a great time. Hopefully tonight will be just as clear and I can make a few more images.

Sep 04, 2013 at 03:37 PM

JimKied
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Into the Heavens

Um, wow. Very nice. Would love to know how you processed this one. Can you share that? Don't want you to reveal any secrets or anything, but the sharpness and clarity of the stars are pretty amazing.

Sep 04, 2013 at 08:01 PM

Steve Dublanko
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Into the Heavens

@Bastian: Excellent that your shooting the Milky Way. It really is something being out in the middle of the night. Good luck!

@Jim: Thanks for the comment and the interest. As far as processing:

The stars were actually pretty sharp already due to the UWA lens. The general rule is to keep the exposure time below 600 / focal length (on full frame) which would be 42s for 14mm. My exposure was 35s so there should be no issues with sharpness.

I used lightroom for the basics (white balance, exposure, shadow detail, noise reduction, distortion correction). Capture sharpening was turned off here (set to 0) mostly because I didn't like how it sharpened the noise. Luminance noise reduction was set to around 40 I think (to get rid of some of the noise in the sky).

The rest of the work was done in photoshop. That includes stitching / blending the images by hand (merge to pano would not work due to the distortion and nature of this image). Milky way was brought out using various curves / levels masked into select parts of the image. Added a little tonal contrast and then sharpened it for web. Had to be careful with the sharpening so as not to sharpen the noise.

Hope that helps!

Sep 04, 2013 at 11:56 PM

alatoo60
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Into the Heavens

That's how it is - no clouds when you want them, and other way around

Really nice picture. Nice stars and reflections. Is green on a horizon - Aurora, by any chance?

Sasha.

Sep 05, 2013 at 01:50 AM

Justin Grimm
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Into the Heavens

Sweet shot dude, I like how it turned out.

And yes Alatoo, we got a tiny bit of aurora. I didnt notice till I looked on my computer. I though it was lights from a small town while shooting

Sep 05, 2013 at 07:56 AM


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