View Full Version : Avebury.........an experiment
HA, well, inspired by Hoodi's pictures t'other day I went over to avebury tonight to try to get some decent star trails.......Things I have learnt....
1) it can get blimmin cold, even in the middle of summer
2) No matter how much tea you take, it's never enough
3) Make sure your batteries are fully charged, 20 minute exposures suck juice!
4) 20 minute exposures and 20 minutes NR makes for a long wait, Take something or someone interesting to do.
5) Don't expect to be able to push the exposures much PP, produces way too much noise!
Anyway, enough of the cod philosophy, I will go back and do them properly next week, I wasn't expecting them to be perfect and they lived up to my expectations lol. The last one is an example of why you need black frame NR, the dots are hot pixels and the purple fog is amp glow from the sensor. The battery (2nd) died during the NR job. I hope I can go back and produce a black frame as this was the best (and longest, 20mins) of the lot.
http://gallery.talkphotography.co.uk/data/553/DSC_1558.jpg
http://gallery.talkphotography.co.uk/data/553/DSC_1559.jpg
http://gallery.talkphotography.co.uk/data/553/DSC_1560.jpg
Anyway, I'm knackered now and off to bed cos it's too late, even for me!
Catdaddy
14-07-2006, 08:37
Nice one Spencer! :thumbs:
First two are the best... Just looking at the traces from the stars, though, couldn't you somehow get the pole star at the top-left third with the rock bottom-right, or something - my eye is getting drawn out of frame because of the concentric part-circles... (if that makes any sense)
Probably! I was there a bit early and there was still a lot of light in the sky towards the north-west. The last one was taken at about 23:00 and you can still see the afterglow from the sunset to the bottom left. And the bloody moon came up too! To get it properly exposed for the last one it would've been a 40 minute exposure! I think I'm gonna try stacking them next as the noise is just too much after about 15 minutes of exposure. Plus repeated exposures and the amp glow just gets ridiculous!
Things I have learnt....Take someone interesting to do.
No better way to pass the time I guess. :lol:
Pretty good starting point for these I reckon. I've been meaning to go and shoot almost exactly that for a couple of years now and I don't think it's about to happen any time soon.
Next time you have a go at these why not save yourself some hassle and pick a film camera on the way past. ;)
Spencer, to me the first one is easily the best of the set, 2nd one is not so bad either ! :)
Shame about the noise and amp glow though !
No better way to pass the time I guess. :lol:
Pretty good starting point for these I reckon. I've been meaning to go and shoot almost exactly that for a couple of years now and I don't think it's about to happen any time soon.
Next time you have a go at these why not save yourself some hassle and pick a film camera on the way past. ;)
I did think about this as I have a dodgy old minolta and a sigma 24mm 1.8 to go on it. Not sure about reciprocity failure though, will have to have a google and see what 'they' say as apparently it can cause problems with colour film due to the 3 colours in the emulsion.
I don't think Avebury is the best place for this now as it's really tricky to find a stone that isn't right by the side of a road, or has a road in the view, or where the car lights don't shine on it. The orange stone in these is caused by the bloody bright light from the pub over the road too, althouigh generally light pollution isn't too bad, just a bit from Marlborough and Swinedon. I'm off to the Hebrides again later this year so will have to try it at Callanaish!
Like the colours in the first two, a good job considering the light pollution and noise issues.
shiato storm
14-07-2006, 12:02
great first attempt...inspiring this long exposure stuff...think I'm going to have to have a go this w/e. does anyone know what might happen if I try it looking out over water? will it go horrible wrong do you think? i.e. best just to point up into the sky instead...
Shouldn't be a problem, the water should come out very smooth looking and ethereal, reflecting any residual light in the sky. You can only try and see! where were you thinking of around brizzol?
Just make sure that you have long exposure NR turned on and several fully charged batteries. I managed about 5 exposures of 15 minutes or so on one battery. Also, it doesn't get proper dark til about 11:30 at the moment and the moon rose last night at about the same time so be careful in which direction you're shooting.
The second shot above has the moon rising in it, was about 11 minutes at f16 and pushed 1.5 stops pp so the exposure should've been about 20 minutes (iso 200)
HTH?
shiato storm
14-07-2006, 13:25
Shouldn't be a problem, the water should come out very smooth looking and ethereal, reflecting any residual light in the sky. You can only try and see! where were you thinking of around brizzol?
getting out of town for the w/e, heading down to deepest darkest somerset...just up the coast from Minehead (no, not butlins)
cheers for tips, yes was wondering where the moon was going to be, noticed it was full recently but rising late. think my battery might be ok with a few exposures at that length but I do intend getting a second at some stage...probably third party - canon batteries are around the £100 mark :eek:
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