Saturday 7 September 2013
HOW TO PHOTOGRAPH STARS AND METEOR SHOWERS
This is a tutorial discussing the basics of photographing
non-star-trails stars and meteor showers.
There are different parts of this tutorial
Part 1: Stars
·
High
apertures
·
Slow
shutter speeds
·
High ISO sensitivities
·
Suggested
exposure settings
·
Menu
settings
·
Tripod
combination choice
·
Triggering
Part 2: MeteorShowers
LOCATION
Finding a good location could be very challenging to find
the darkest spot to photograph stars and meteor showers. The location must have
as few lights as possible for near to no light pollution. For instance at least
an hour away from the nearest city, town, National park, small island, or in
the middle of the desert etc
Photographing on elevated areas near city, town such as on
top of mountain will not help due to light pollution.
What is light pollution? It is where the night sky is
brightened by street lights and or any other light source. Location with near
to no light pollution is where there is hardly any streetlight and or any other
bright light sources.
TIMING
Timing is as important as finding a good location. However,
we cannot give the most accurate timing since it is different around the globe.
The main key of timing is to go out and shoot on new moon nights. On new moon
nights the best timing to photograph the stars and meteor showers is two hours
after sunset or before sunrise. This time period will deliver the maximum
blackness to the sky, brightened out the stars and meteor showers.
If you wish to have a little blue added to the sky you can
start photographing around 45-60 minutes after the sunset or before sunrise.
There will be some experimentation needed to get the desires result. Expect
some slightly overexposed or underexposed photographs.
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