Perseids from North York Moors

AndWhyNot

AndWhyNot

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Found myself amongst the dark skies of the North York Moors for the peak of this year's Perseid meteor shower. Better still, the skies were brilliantly clear.

Facing southwest-ish I set up my A7s with the Sony Zeiss 16-35mm at its widest to capture the milky way, just in case I didn't succeed to record any Perseids. Turns out I needn't have worried :)

Caught this one super-bright meteor which left a smoke trail visible for a couple of minutes afterwards.

Incoming!!!

And from the same composition I created a composite/ layered image of all the other meteors which fell during my time on site.

Perseids over St Stephen's

Once the above was running I walked round to the other side of the church and set up my other A7s facing the opposite direction. Took a slightly different approach here and used a couple of my Nikon primes via a cheap mount adaptor. The first at 50mm was shot on the Monday night, as I took the opportunity to get out beneath the first clear night not knowing if the weather's generosity would hold up.

Perseids over St Stephen's (50mm)

With conditions remaining clear, I returned on the Wednesday night and used my 35mm for a vertical composition.

Perseids over St Stephen's (35mm)

It's a fair bit of hassle shooting two cameras at the same time but I'm glad I used the longer lenses and recorded the vivid greens in the comets' tails.

Thanks for looking. All comments and technique queries welcome.
 
Stunning and by far the best Ive seen yet, Cant give any crit at all
 
Amazing set, envy you having sky that clear, plagued with cloud down south.
 
All great shots but I really like the last one. Presumably that is the Perseus constellation above/left of the church where they're emanating from?
 
"Excellent" work Andrew, nothing more to be said.(y)

George.
 
Best set I've seen this year that's for sure, well done (y)
 
To many of them are strangely uniform for my liking.
Sorry but they dont look real to me.
 
Thanks, all. Naturally very pleased that the late nights weren't in vain. Shame the area has such dire data signal or I might have been able get a few out to my agency for release to the media :/

Bigfungun said:
To many of them are strangely uniform for my liking.
Sorry but they dont look real to me.
Click to expand...

Perseids are caused by the same material burning up in the same way having emanated from the same position in the sky. By definition they're a bit same-y. What were you expecting, pirouettes?
 
Deckard said:
All great shots but I really like the last one. Presumably that is the Perseus constellation above/left of the church where they're emanating from?
Click to expand...

I can't make out the constellation within the image but as that shot is facing NE certainly it's the right direction.
 
AndWhyNot said:
Thanks, all. Naturally very pleased that the late nights weren't in vain. Shame the area has such dire data signal or I might have been able get a few out to my agency for release to the media :/



Perseids are caused by the same material burning up in the same way having emanated from the same position in the sky. By definition they're a bit same-y. What were you expecting, pirouettes?
Click to expand...

I know exactly what they are. Im saying I believe you have cloned them.
 
Yep, definitely some of the best perseid images I have seen, with the second being my persona; favourite. It really captures the event perfectly!
 
AndWhyNot said:
Found myself amongst the dark skies of the North York Moors for the peak of this year's Perseid meteor shower. Better still, the skies were brilliantly clear.

Facing southwest-ish I set up my A7s with the Sony Zeiss 16-35mm at its widest to capture the milky way, just in case I didn't succeed to record any Perseids. Turns out I needn't have worried :)

Caught this one super-bright meteor which left a smoke trail visible for a couple of minutes afterwards.

Incoming!!!

And from the same composition I created a composite/ layered image of all the other meteors which fell during my time on site.

Perseids over St Stephen's

Once the above was running I walked round to the other side of the church and set up my other A7s facing the opposite direction. Took a slightly different approach here and used a couple of my Nikon primes via a cheap mount adaptor. The first at 50mm was shot on the Monday night, as I took the opportunity to get out beneath the first clear night not knowing if the weather's generosity would hold up.

Perseids over St Stephen's (50mm)

With conditions remaining clear, I returned on the Wednesday night and used my 35mm for a vertical composition.

Perseids over St Stephen's (35mm)

It's a fair bit of hassle shooting two cameras at the same time but I'm glad I used the longer lenses and recorded the vivid greens in the comets' tails.

Thanks for looking. All comments and technique queries welcome.
Click to expand...


I absolutely love these.
Well done and how fortunate you were to be in such a place on a night like that.
 
Thanks to almost everyone for your ongoing kind words :)

Bigfungun said:
I know exactly what they are. Im saying I believe you have cloned them.
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I thought that's what you were implying but, naturally, hoped otherwise.

My folks brought me up not to deceive, so I don't. They also taught me in ways that could be best summarised as not responding to trolls, but in this case I'll make an exception.

As already stated, I was away for the duration of the Perseid shower. This turned out to be immensely favourable in terms of location & conditions but meant that editing was undertaken on the small screen of my MacBook, on the uncomfortable sofa of a slightly damp caravan, in the short space of time between walking back from the location at first light and the kids waking up. Such were my attempts at not disturbing the family, I didn't even make myself the customary "photo editor's cup of tea".

When taken together, those factors may have conspired to take the sheen off my editing prowess and left the posted images a teensy bit rough around the edges. On the other hand, as you're the only person to have questioned the files it might just be that you're an implacable cynic.

Anyway, given that I much prefer the process of photography to the process of editing, I shoot RAW + JPG with the aim of using the camera files wherever possible. Whilst the posted file is an output of both Lightroom (for the previously described tonal adjustments) and Photoshop (for layering), my shooting preferences have left me in a position to select and post a series of files straight from the camera and without edits*. So, that is what I've done here:

Feel free to spend as long as you care to poring over these camera files. Share my pain as the ambient light grows from file to file, eventually eradicating the green airglow that would've brought a further aesthetic feature to the final shot. Reflect on the several smaller meteors I chose to omit, such was my luck with larger or brighter trails. Explore the EXIF. Delight in the absence of any mention of editing software. Deliberate on how else I might have cloned meteors, and why? Calculate the total elapsed time for 539 frames of 4 seconds each, for no real reason other than to know how much time passed between the first & last recorded meteors. Think how many I missed in that time. Marvel at how useable are the unedited* JPGs from a Sony A7s at ISO6400.

Once all that's out the way, haul back over here and tell me if it's appropriate to rename the flickr album - in a flash of inspiration, it's so far titled "Doubting Chris". Just don't tell my folks I ignored their advice ;)
_____
* I used the "Preview" app on my Mac to resize the files to 1200px; sorry, but despite responding to your questioning of my integrity, I don't quite take it seriously enough to warrant posting full res files given that as soon as I watermarked them they'd show as edited. For the same reason, I've only deconstructed one of the three composite files. If your doubts remain after that, I figure that posting the other two is unlikely to please you.
 
So one of your pictures is a layered composition of all the meteors you shot. A total of 539 frames at 4 seconds each totalling roughly 36 minutes and only the merest hint of a star trail.
Impressive setup you have that can match the stars movement.
Strangely though on the link you have posted for Flickr (thanks for the mention) there is some very obvious evidence of star trails on the individual pictures but less on the several hundred, 36 minute composite.

The pictures are nice and all that im just not convinced that you arrived at them as you claimed.
Its no big deal either way. As I said they are pretty and creative and if you are happy with them then that is all that matters.
 
It seems you don't understand either the shooting technique or processing methodology. Or both. Maybe that's my bad for not explaining the minutiae of each but, regardless, why not ask these questions before making unfounded accusations.

Bigfungun said:
So one of your pictures is a layered composition of all the meteors you shot.
Click to expand...

Three of them are. The first highlights only the brightest meteor I captured in any of the frames. The second is (obviously, I thought) based on the same composition as the first but features all meteors captured over about 90 minutes. The other two were shot from the other side of the church, on two separate nights. Using longer lenses (50mm & 35mm respectively vs 16mm for the first two images) has magnified the meteors' appearance.


Bigfungun said:
A total of 539 frames at 4 seconds each totalling roughly 36 minutes and only the merest hint of a star trail.
Click to expand...

None of the images are *stacked* as in using the whole of each frame. I picked the most suitable single frame (from the 539 or however many) as a base and layered in only the meteor from other frames. That's why there's no star trails. The thought process behind this is based more on aesthetics than effort. It's arguably easier to process and stack all frames in their entirety than to manually select, layer and mask just the frames containing meteors. But in stacking, the resultant startrails would overwhelm the appearance of any meteors. If I was to stack just the 31 frames containing meteors, the startrails would again diminish the visual impact of the meteors plus their appearance would be intermittent and, I suspect, hugely distracting.


Bigfungun said:
Impressive setup you have that can match the stars movement.
Click to expand...

Such equipment is available.

Bigfungun said:
Strangely though on the link you have posted for Flickr (thanks for the mention) there is some very obvious evidence of star trails on the individual pictures but less on the several hundred, 36 minute composite.
Click to expand...

4-second frames shouldn't be producing startrails so, for the sake of accuracy, I think you're seeing lens coma rather than startrails per se. It's consequence of a/ shooting at the lens's widest aperture; and b/ using the lens with a cheap mount adaptor. Nonetheless, I'd hazard a guess that any difference you can see is because here on TP the files are shown at 800px whereas the files on flickr are at 1200px. Possibly there's also a reduction in chromatic aberration around the brighter stars when reviewing edited vs unedited but, really, there should be little discernible difference between the two when compared size-for-size.

Bigfungun said:
The pictures are nice and all that im just not convinced that you arrived at them as you claimed.
Click to expand...

See the final statement of my previous post.

Bigfungun said:
Its no big deal either way. As I said they are pretty and creative and if you are happy with them then that is all that matters.
Click to expand...

Excellent. I'm glad it doesn't matter that you accused me of faking my pictures. That's a big relief.
 
Got to say I think @Bigfungun owes Andrew an apology for basically accusing him of faking his photos, I've been fortunate to have been familiar with Andrews work for many years now, and know exactly how talented he is (in my opinion he is one of the UK's very best night time artists), I'm also pleased to be able to consider him a friend and know just how much of a decent guy he is
 
MWHCVT said:
Got to say I think @Bigfungun owes Andrew an apology for basically accusing him of faking his photos, I've been fortunate to have been familiar with Andrews work for many years now, and know exactly how talented he is (in my opinion he is one of the UK's very best night time artists), I'm also pleased to be able to consider him a friend and know just how much of a decent guy he is
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Well considering he did only take the meteor part of select pictures and make a composite of those then i stand by my statement.
I guess we all have different views on creative license.
 
Bigfungun said:
Well considering he did only take the meteor part of select pictures and make a composite of those then i stand by my statement.
I guess we all have different views on creative license.
Click to expand...

And it says right in the opening post about composites...what you accused him of doing was creating fake meteors...he hast not faked anything, he captured everything seen in these images and then merged them to create a some stunning images...nothing fake at all about them
 
Fantastic ! hard to choose a favourite but I think number 1, great you had such a clear night & definitely made the most of it Andrew
 
Bigfungun said:
Well considering he did only take the meteor part of select pictures and make a composite of those then i stand by my statement.
Click to expand...

Which statement is that?

Bigfungun said:
To many of them are strangely uniform for my liking.
Sorry but they dont look real to me.
Click to expand...

or

Bigfungun said:
...Im saying I believe you have cloned them.
Click to expand...

---

Bigfungun said:
I guess we all have different views on creative license.
Click to expand...

...yours seem to extend into vocabulary & definitions, inasmuch as you're continuing to liken cloning with intent to decieve to openly compositing multiple genuine photographic captures. The implication and connotation of each are hugely different.
 
Bigfungun said:
Well considering he did only take the meteor part of select pictures and make a composite of those then i stand by my statement.
I guess we all have different views on creative license.
Click to expand...
What you accused him of is completely different to what he described and subsequently went on to detail in depth with supporting evidence. I think you are out of line here...
 
I sadly missed them due to low cloud and rain as has been the norm for this summer.

Thanks for sharing the photos and explaining how you created the composites. I look forward to a few clear skies before the less cold weather finishes and though I doubt there will be any other good displays before the leonids in November and they don't sound as though there's going to be much of a display to see then.
 
Some really great shots here, I wasn't able to get to a good location this year unfortunately.

Love the third one but they're all good. In some the sky looks a little green, not sure if its due to light pollution or noise- or it might just be me. I normally like a very black/dark sky and drop it in the edit.
 
Derek_W said:
I look forward to a few clear skies before the less cold weather finishes and though I doubt there will be any other good displays before the leonids in November and they don't sound as though there's going to be much of a display to see then.
Click to expand...

The Perseids is king of the showers but Leonids & Geminids are both worth heading out for. Just be sure to push the ISO as far as comfortable, and then a little bit more, to have your best chance of capturing something.

Oj9400 said:
In some the sky looks a little green, not sure if its due to light pollution or noise- or it might just be me. I normally like a very black/dark sky and drop it in the edit.
Click to expand...

The green tinge in the skies is down to the atmospheric phenomenon of airglow. It's even more noticeable in some of the early, single meteor frames but for each composite I had to use the brightest sky frame which conceals it slightly.
 
I went out with my lad to capture them but on my camera I left VR on by mistake so ruined my shots. My lad however did pretty well - he's going to submit his for part of his GCSE coursework.

I think the composites work well and would be happy if I'd taken them - great work:)
 
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