This was my second outing with my SkyGuider pro. Starting to the hang of it, but still lots to learn, especially in the processing department. I think picking the right foreground is the toughest part for me, but I thought this worked well. This is 3 3 minute exposures blended. I took the first image with the tracker off, then the next 2 with the tracker on. Love to hear some thoughts on this one.
I get star trails after 30 seconds, did you use Starry Landscape Stacker to fix the trails?
As previously stated, is the green at the bottom left an artifact of processing?
It's a great picture and the like the composition. I've seen other bring up the foreground exposure on pics so that might look good in yours.
Have you looked at Ian Norman's site? He's quite good at astro pics.
Thanks for sharing, it's a nice photo.
Steve
It's actually 3 3 minute exposures using a star tracker and then stacked and blended. I used a combination of Deep Sky Stacker, Raya Pro and Photoshop to create the image you see here. I tried Sequator, but liked the results from Deep Sky Stacker a bit better. I actually bumped the exposure down on the foreground as I thought it overpowered the image a bit for my tastes.
The green hue did bother me, but as I said, my processing needs "polishing" and I am watching YouTube videos to see if I can find a way to eliminate it.
I'll have to try Deep Sky Stacker. I've been using Sequator and liking it, but it's the only one I've ever used. I'm curious, is there anything specific about DSS that you prefer (or, conversely, didn't like about Sequator)?
amacal1 wrote:
I'll have to try Deep Sky Stacker. I've been using Sequator and liking it, but it's the only one I've ever used. I'm curious, is there anything specific about DSS that you prefer (or, conversely, didn't like about Sequator)?
Both work pretty well. I like the interface better in DST over Sequator, but it's just a personal preference. I am new to Astro so I know I have a lot to learn, so my preferences may shift as I learn more. The "game changer" for me is the star tracker. With 2-3 minute exposures, I can drop the ISO down to ~800 which greatly reduces noise which helps a lot in overall picture quality. Combined with stacking to eliminate noise, the overall improvement is pretty impressive.
rwolson wrote:
Love the composition and final image. I know the location WELL!
The green In the lower left corner's airglow which you'll capture during night photos. Personally, I'd leave the airglow in.
I purchased a star tracker earlier in the year and still waiting to try it out.
Thanks for the comment. The Acadia coast is pretty incredible and I don't think you can pick a bad spot to photograph. As far as the airglow is concerned, I did a quick reprocess after I learned how to remove it, and I actually prefer it in the shot so I left it be.
Not sure which star tracker you bought, but I own the SkyGuider Pro and like it a lot. Once you master ( I use that term loosely) the alignment process, it is amazing how easy it is to get sharp starts with a long, 2-4 minute, exposure with little noise (other than hot pixels). Long exposure NR gets rid of them, but it coubles the time needed to actually take the photo..
rmt3rd wrote:
With the 3 minute exposures, did you get any red heat bands within the photos from the sensor heating up?
Not that I saw while processing. The only thing was the green airglow. It was around 52F, so it was't super hot. My only issue was hot pixels. I usually leave long exposure NR on, but turned it off that night to see what difference it makes. BTW, long exposure NR virtually eliminates hot pixels, but doubles the time needed to take the photo.
Wonderful image, and well processed in my opinion. If this were my image, I would leave the left corner airglow in the image, but see if I could pull just a hint of detail out of the dark trees (not much, just a hint). Good work on this!
Keith W.
RKnecht wrote:
It's actually 3 3 minute exposures using a star tracker and then stacked and blended. I used a combination of Deep Sky Stacker, Raya Pro and Photoshop to create the image you see here. I tried Sequator, but liked the results from Deep Sky Stacker a bit better. I actually bumped the exposure down on the foreground as I thought it overpowered the image a bit for my tastes.
The green hue did bother me, but as I said, my processing needs "polishing" and I am watching YouTube videos to see if I can find a way to eliminate it.
I was confused, you said it was 3 3 minute exposures blended. and the tracker was off on the first.
I picked up the SkyGuider Pro. Several times I planned on using the tracker and the clouds rolled in for the night. I may just take it out and start learning alignment.
If using dss for PP work, you should ideally be taking dark frames of the same exposure time of 3 mins. Dss subtract that during the stack.
Nice picture
