p.1 #1 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
From my 4th day of 5 exploring the Alpine Loop, the Milky Way and Jupiter rise over the ridgeline between Red Mountains #1 and 2. Red Mountain #2 is the prominent red/orange peak that sits above Hwy 550, the 'Million Dollar Highway'. Corkscrew Gulch Road heads up from 550 just below Ironton, and continues (past the switchbacks in this image) on up to Hurricane Pass.
After a nice sunset with some clouds, the sky conditions were phenomenal on this night (note the red/green airglow below arc of Milky Way). I spent five hours on a talus flow photographing from golden hour past midnight:
Canon 5Ds w/Tamron SP 35/1.4
Sky 10s, f/1.8, ISO 4000 (two rows of 7 images)
Foreground 50s, f/1.8, ISO 4000 (focus-stacked using 14 images)
433MP panorama, 114x42" at native resolution
Daylight white balance for sky, cooled the foreground about 800k to take the edge off the intense oranges/reds
The Canon 5Ds still does it for me, but certainly makes me work for it at night! This is the first image I've posted since getting the Tamron SP 35/1.4, which I am incredibly impressed with. It's significantly better than the Sigma 35/1.4 Art I had for a bit, and probably gets very close to the 40mm Art. Very, very little comatic aberration, and about the only thing you need to watch out for with night images is the vignetting, which obviously increases the noise in the corners once a profile is applied.
More here, if interested in seeing a few more images (all using Tamron 35/1.4).
p.1 #3 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Absolutely fantastic. I too love the late spring early summer moly way arch here in SoCal. It has to be one of the most astonishing annual occurrences and I try to make it out every year for it.
p.1 #6 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Thanks all, I'm happy with this image. Data acquisition took about an hour... post-processing? Let's just say a bit more than that.
zurura wrote:
This is stunning Jeff. Loved how the entire arc of the milky way is set against the mountain. The panorama format really works here.
Sorry for the silly question but did you use some sort of tracker for the milky way to retain position while stitching?
- Gautam
No 'tracker'. I use a Nodal Ninja M2 Giga head, super-great for panos like this. Keeps you engaged, too, not like a machine that just auto-fires the entire array of images while in a camp chair sipping an IPA (kind of like flying a helicopter compared to an airplane... lol).
p.1 #7 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Jeff wrote:
Thanks all, I'm happy with this image. Data acquisition took about an hour... post-processing? Let's just say a bit more than that.
No 'tracker'. I use a Nodal Ninja M2 Giga head, super-great for panos like this. Keeps you engaged, too, not like a machine that just auto-fires the entire array of images while in a camp chair sipping an IPA (kind of like flying a helicopter compared to an airplane... lol).
Just looked at the nodal ninja M2 and great Scott man that looks like one hell of an accessory to learn how to use!
p.1 #8 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
kezeka wrote:
Just looked at the nodal ninja M2 and great Scott man that looks like one hell of an accessory to learn how to use!
Yeah, it's fairly complex, and there's a couple of 'features' I haven't yet used. This 'Giga' model allows shooting with lenses up to 400mm (i.e. many rows), but so far I've only shot 4-row panos (@280mm). If you only shoot wide, there are less complex options from NN (for the y-axis) that work just as well, if not easier and smaller. As I've learned to use it, I've become pretty astounded at the thoughtfulness/cleverness of the design as well as the robustness/precision of the manufacturing. Definitely have to have your act together to use it at night!
I originally wanted to stick with RRS gear, but having a consistent way to quickly/accurately return to an azimuth or elevation is important when shooting multiple panos as weather changes, and it has served me well.
p.1 #9 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
kezeka wrote:
Absolutely fantastic. I too love the late spring early summer moly way arch here in SoCal. It has to be one of the most astonishing annual occurrences and I try to make it out every year for it.
It really is an amazing thing. I can't believe how many people see some of my Milky Way images and ask "What is that?" Comet Neowise is another thing that everyone really needs to see (and it's much easier to see from light-polluted areas than the Milky Way); it really is spectacular, and a comet this good doesn't come around too often.
p.1 #10 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Very nice, and I like your choice in processing.
No tracking? Are you stacking at all? I'd be curious what the noise looks like with that camera. I haven't done a MW pano with my 6d Mk2, but did a few with the EOS M6 - using the 22 EFM and the Sigma Art 1.4 - I used the RRS pano gimble atop a tracker - did 2-4 shots tracked, then stacked, then stitched. ~8-12 camera positions.
I wish I had done more research - but I got the RRS setup primarily for landscape and architectural stitching before I starting making images at night. Having an indexed head would be a huge time saver and make things so much simpler... in daylight the RRS is not so bad, so long as you stick to your notes and don't forget where you left off... but at night its a challenge.
p.1 #13 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
bmike-vt wrote:
Very nice, and I like your choice in processing.
No tracking? Are you stacking at all? I'd be curious what the noise looks like with that camera. I haven't done a MW pano with my 6d Mk2, but did a few with the EOS M6 - using the 22 EFM and the Sigma Art 1.4 - I used the RRS pano gimble atop a tracker - did 2-4 shots tracked, then stacked, then stitched. ~8-12 camera positions.
I wish I had done more research - but I got the RRS setup primarily for landscape and architectural stitching before I starting making images at night. Having an indexed head would be a huge time saver and make things so much simpler... in daylight the RRS is not so bad, so long as you stick to your notes and don't forget where you left off... but at night its a challenge. ...Show more →
No tracking, no stacking, just much evaluation of images captured at different ambient temps trying to decide the ISO at which sensor pattern noise is overwhelmed. I'll try to post a crop when I get a chance.
I'm ready for a new camera for night work, honestly. Between the 5Ds sensor and Lightroom's constantly poor performance and lingering bugs, I find myself often sitting at the computer visualizing putting a baseball bat through the iMac screen... Lightroom is not fond of ingesting and allowing one to work on files the size of this one.
p.1 #14 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Jeff wrote:
No tracking, no stacking, just much evaluation of images captured at different ambient temps trying to decide the ISO at which sensor pattern noise is overwhelmed. I'll try to post a crop when I get a chance.
I'm ready for a new camera for night work, honestly. Between the 5Ds sensor and Lightroom's constantly poor performance and lingering bugs, I find myself often sitting at the computer visualizing putting a baseball bat through the iMac screen... Lightroom is not fond of ingesting and allowing one to work on files the size of this one.
I'll take that errant screen off your hands.
I use LR now days, but I don't know enough about it to even know its weaknesses and bugs.
LR better get with it - there are a few more big-file cameras out there with an R5 on the way...
p.1 #15 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
Tom_W wrote:
I'll take that errant screen off your hands.
I use LR now days, but I don't know enough about it to even know its weaknesses and bugs.
LR better get with it - there are a few more big-file cameras out there with an R5 on the way...
PS - fantastic shot!
No doubt, they'd better! It was one thing when the 5Ds file size was an outlier for a few years, but today, there is no excuse (the fact that we all pay monthly now makes the issues unconscionable). Lightroom is the best, [I]worst[/I] piece of photo management/editing software out there, and it changed my life when it first came out. There are bugs that have been there literally since v2, and the ongoing memory leak issues are ridiculous... the more ram you have, the more it takes (regardless of whether it's actually using it or not), the more it takes, the slower it runs, and it won't release the resources, no matter what.
p.1 #16 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
No 'tracker'. I use a Nodal Ninja M2 Giga head, super-great for panos like this. Keeps you engaged, too, not like a machine that just auto-fires the entire array of images while in a camp chair sipping an IPA (kind of like flying a helicopter compared to an airplane... lol).
Thanks for this. This looks really complex mate. More of like X-plane against MS Flight Simulator
Not a helicopter guy - fixed wing over rotary wings for me unless it is a smallish UAV named DJI.
p.1 #19 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
zurura wrote:
Thanks for this. This looks really complex mate. More of like X-plane against MS Flight Simulator
Not a helicopter guy - fixed wing over rotary wings for me unless it is a smallish UAV named DJI.
Funny, and apt, as well.
Danpbphoto wrote:
OUTSTANDING composition!!! Perfectly exposed!
Dan
Thanks, it was a great spot in the world.
lawrence.omara wrote:
Beautiful shot. The mountains and Milky Way seem to fit well together.
p.1 #20 · Milk Way rises over Corkscrew Gulch, San Juan County, CO
bmike-vt wrote:
Very nice, and I like your choice in processing.
No tracking? Are you stacking at all? I'd be curious what the noise looks like with that camera. I haven't done a MW pano with my 6d Mk2, but did a few with the EOS M6 - using the 22 EFM and the Sigma Art 1.4 - I used the RRS pano gimble atop a tracker - did 2-4 shots tracked, then stacked, then stitched. ~8-12 camera positions.
I wish I had done more research - but I got the RRS setup primarily for landscape and architectural stitching before I starting making images at night. Having an indexed head would be a huge time saver and make things so much simpler... in daylight the RRS is not so bad, so long as you stick to your notes and don't forget where you left off... but at night its a challenge. ...Show more →
Here you go, 1:1 crop, first image below. Note the (subtle) star effect around Jupiter, even at f/1.8; I'm a huge fan of this lens.
Second image is upper-left corner at f/1.4, third image is upper-right corner of same image; virtually no coma (a tiny bit on right side, but for f/1.4, this result is one to two orders of magnitude better than any other lens I've used). Really, the vignetting is the limiting factor using this lens at night (pretty similar to that of Sigma Art 35/1.4.
I know you asked about the sensor noise, not the lens, but the 5Ds' noise characteristics are pretty widely described at this point. Getting the ISO right for the ambient temp is about the only thing you can do with the 5Ds... aside from careful processing.
Lightroom is not fond of ingesting and allowing one to work on files the size of this one. 
