Justin Wolff May 8, 2018 - 4:37 pm

Dark Horse

Last night was my first time using a star tracker with a medium telephoto lens, and I must admit I'm hooked! This was shot a 70mm, ISO 800, with a 60" on a Nikon D750. I prefer the B&W over the color version, but both are super clean.

5 Comments

Maximilian Sulzer May 9, 2018 - 5:35 am

Thanks for sticking Katy Perry in my ear man...

Nice images, i prefer the color version.

Justin Wolff May 9, 2018 - 1:44 pm

Maximilian Sulzer

Thanks!! Haha, every time I photograph the core you know what song i think of...:)

Bill Metallinos May 9, 2018 - 9:06 am

Hi, Jay. Nice shot!
I like both of them, I prefer the color but the b&w has no color noise.

Also if you want more contrast:
Try to merge b&w with the Color. Just to the b&w highlight more the highlights and drop the darks. It's like a Pseudo-Ha (Ha false color).
--Image/ Apply image, add, 10% opacity, -50 offset

For much much better result try to take ~10 same captures and Stack them (with Photoshop or Deepskystacker etc). Then process the 16bit Tiff with the Double++ details and quality ;)

Justin Wolff May 9, 2018 - 1:48 pm

Bill Metallinos

Thank you for the suggestions! This was my first go with anything like this, and I know I have a bunch to learn.

I think I'll try adding more contrast with merging in the B&W. I've seen that done before, and i like the results.

As for stacking, I only took shots for 50 mins, and didn't think about taking multiple exposures. But come this weekend, I'll definatley give that a go as well.

Any tutorials you can recommenced me to?

Bill Metallinos May 10, 2018 - 9:28 am

Justin Wolff

I just found it, but I think it can help you with the stacking.
https://fstoppers.com/composite/create-noise-free-images-using-exposure…

Also with Adobe Raw you can ad some "Dehaze"
-You can also try NIK Collection, Vivezza2, so you can add some "Clarity" to the Darks or any change topical.