Shooting skills to capture the perfect galaxy

The human naked eye has rich visual potential. Even in the dark night sky, we can see stars, meteors and the Milky Way. However, how to use the excellent performance of digital SLR cameras to show starry sky images beyond the limits of human vision?

The following landscape photographer Tommer Lazabi will tell you how to take a good night view of the Milky Way under the starry sky and the important matters that should be paid attention to before leaving. As long as you bring the right equipment, find the right place and have the right concept of photography, everyone has the opportunity to become a master of the night view of the Milky Way in the starry sky.

1. suggested equipment

Camera: Digital SLR, with good performance under high ISO, especially in Quan Huafu.

Lens: Wide-angle lens with large aperture allows light to reach the camera photosensitive element as much as possible.

Tripod: A stable tripod is conducive to long-time exposure shooting, especially in the case of low-angle mode.

2. Shooting environment

Avoid light damage: Away from any artificial light source, distant cities will produce yellow-green light on the horizon.

Height: The higher the altitude, the thinner the air, and the more stars can be observed.

Air pollution: avoid shooting in areas with serious air pollution, and try to choose sunny and cloudless weather.

Consider moonlight: the moonlight is too strong to see the stars during the full moon; A few days before and after the new moon is ideal, and the faint moonlight helps to illuminate the foreground; The new moon has no moonlight at all, and the star point is the most perfect, but the foreground needs artificial light source to fill the light.

3.ISO sensitivity

In the night environment, in order to get enough light, we often raise the ISO to above 800, which can make the photosensitive element of the camera more acute and get more subtle light. However, using high ISO is not without its drawbacks. The higher the ISO value, the more obvious the noise in the photo.

Q: How to reduce the noise of high ISO?

Answer: Choose a camera with high ISO performance, such as Quan Huafu SLR camera and micro camera, or use post-processing software such as Photoshop and Lightroom to eliminate noise.

4. Hole

Generally, under the condition of sufficient light, a small aperture can get enough depth of field, but in the night environment, we should try our best to get light, so we must find out the maximum aperture value that can be used and calculate it by hyperfocal distance principle.

Q: How to control the aperture and depth of field?

A: Take the lens of 14mm F2.8 as an example. According to the depth of field data, we can know that the hyperfocal distance of the lens is 2.5 meters under the aperture of F2.8, so as long as we focus on the target with a distance of about 2.5 meters, the range of depth of field can be extended from 1.5 meters to infinity, which is generally enough (the depth of field data of various lenses can be queried through the network or related mobile phone apps).

The problem often encountered in shooting starry night scenes is that the starlight of the Milky Way will be very bright when exposed for a long time with a tripod and a slow shutter, but it seems to have a feeling of shaking and stretching, which is caused by the rotation of the earth. To solve this problem, we can calculate the appropriate shutter speed for lenses with different focal lengths through the formula of "starry sky 600 rule".

Q: How to calculate the appropriate shutter speed?

A: The starry sky 600 rule refers to converting the shutter speed suitable for each focusing lens based on the value of "600". Taking a full-frame camera as an example, if 600 is divided by 600mm lens, the conversion result is 1 second, 600 is divided by 100mm, and the shutter speed is 6 seconds, and so on, which can effectively prevent the jitter and elongation of the stars caused by the earth's rotation.

Common examples

24mm (Quan Huafu), 17mm(APS-C): The ideal shutter speed is about 30 seconds (600 divided by 24mm).

16mm (Quan Huafu) and 10mm(APS-C): The ideal shutter speed is about 45 seconds (600 divided by 16mm).

14mm (Quan Huafu): The ideal shutter speed is about 50 seconds (600 divided by 14mm).

If the star point is still shaking and elongated, try to shorten the shutter speed from 10 to 15 seconds.

5. Composition mode

The typical composition of starry night photography is mainly based on the starry galaxy, and the camera sticks to the ground to shoot upwards, with the best effect. At the same time, in order to increase the richness of the composition, some mountains, landscapes, trees or strange rocks are usually added to the foreground, and the best effect is placed in the lower part of the composition.

If the moonlight in the night sky is too weak and the prospect is too dim, we can use several artificial light sources (such as flash, LED light, flashlight, etc.). ) brighten the front scene and adjust the intensity of the light source according to the exposure time. In addition, in order to make the foreground look more stereoscopic, it is suggested to fill the light from the left and right sides, and the effect will be ideal.

If you want to make the Galaxy look cooler, we can set the custom white balance of the camera to 2500k to 3500K, but the foreground will also be blue. At this time, it is necessary to consider adding a warm color filter to the artificial light source to balance the color temperature of the foreground.