Return to Rainier

coscorrosa

The road to Sunrise officially opened last Friday, harkening for me the official return of Summer and first of many trips to my favorite volcano.

The forecast looked like it would be decent for sunrise (it wasn't, mountain was hidden beneath thick layers of fog), but my main reason for going was for the stars that night (clear forecast and a new moon). The conditions were perfect matching the forecast and there's still a bit of snow on the mountain too.

#1 - Milky Way



#2 - Star Trails



The bears were still hanging around the lower elevations too:

Yetishot

Those are really nice, I love the detail in the mountains in number two:)

redleash

Like #1 a lot, Ron. How long was your exposure for the star trails? I think I have to go farther west to try it someday--too much city light here. Nice bear shot too.

Lauren

schmoo

I think this is my favorite star trail shot from you yet! I love the swoopies.

Emancipator

Yes, how long of an exposure? Well done.

I've seen some with 30s of bumped iso but I like those that are maybe 20min at iso 100.

coscorrosa

Yetishot wrote: »

Those are really nice, I love the detail in the mountains in number two:)

Thanks!

redleash wrote: »

Like #1 a lot, Ron. How long was your exposure for the star trails? I think I have to go farther west to try it someday--too much city light here. Nice bear shot too.

Lauren

95 minutes - it wasn't a single exposure but rather 19 5-minute exposures (f/3.2 ISO 400 5 minutes) blended together. And the mountain was from an earlier exposure when there was more light (f/4 ISO 400 2 minutes). And some other fancy stuff to blend them together in a way that hid the Milky Way that I'm still working on perfecting.

schmoo wrote: »

I think this is my favorite star trail shot from you yet! I love the swoopies.

Swoopies FTW!

Emancipator wrote: »

Yes, how long of an exposure? Well done.

I've seen some with 30s of bumped iso but I like those that are maybe 20min at iso 100.

The Milky Way shot was f/2.8 ISO 3200 for 27 seconds, using the same mountain foreground I used for the star trails shots. The star trails shot was about 95 minutes.

Doug Solis

Good work Ron. I think I'm partial to the static version of the stars rather than star trails. Especially when you incorporate it with the Milky Way as you have done. I have captured neither so my opinion might change after I do a few. Nice job.

coscorrosa

Doug Solis wrote: »

Good work Ron. I think I'm partial to the static version of the stars rather than star trails. Especially when you incorporate it with the Milky Way as you have done. I have captured neither so my opinion might change after I do a few. Nice job.

Thanks - I'm not sure which I prefer, there are some issues with the star trails shots (mostly because of the removal of the Milky Way - stuff that would show up in higher than web magnifications (or prints)). The Milky Way sky was really noisy, but because the sky is almost all luminosity and not much color, I applied aggressive noise reduction to it then blended it in with a longer exposure with lower noise of the mountain. I think it might actually look decent as a print. Eventually the technology will improve where shots of the Milky Way and stars in general won't involve so many compromises or post processing.

wolf911

wow, the first one with the stars is awesome. I've been looking into that kinda thing.

annnna8888

Love all three shots! I have always been partial to star trails, but the Milky Way photo is wonderful too. Be brave, have them printed biiiiig.

Ana

redleash

Ron, what did you use to blend the 19 shots together? I am getting reasonably good at blending 2-3 shots by hand but haven't tried any automated fusions (other than Fotomatix for HDR). Any further tips on PP on the star shots that you would like to share? Thanks, Lauren

denisegoldberg

All beautiful, but my favorite (by far) is the first shot.

--- Denise

coscorrosa

wolf911 wrote: »

wow, the first one with the stars is awesome. I've been looking into that kinda thing.

Most people are shocked that you can actually see let alone photograph the Milky Way. It does help to be in the western US where there are pockets of significantly lower light pollution.

annnna8888 wrote: »

Love all three shots! I have always been partial to star trails, but the Milky Way photo is wonderful too. Be brave, have them printed biiiiig.

Ana

Sure, give me your credit card number and I'll run some experiments

redleash wrote: »

Ron, what did you use to blend the 19 shots together? I am getting reasonably good at blending 2-3 shots by hand but haven't tried any automated fusions (other than Fotomatix for HDR). Any further tips on PP on the star shots that you would like to share? Thanks, Lauren

Here you go:

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/13098771_t6ehR

Essentially, you can open each image as a separate layer within a single Photoshop document and use the lighten blending mode. There's other stuff involved too and the above link goes into more details.

In general I'm not in favor of any software that does automatic exposure blending to increase dynamic range (including tone-mapping software like Photomatix), but that's a separate rant

denisegoldberg wrote: »

All beautiful, but my favorite (by far) is the first shot.

--- Denise

Thanks! It was as clear as I have ever seen it at Mt. Rainier.

zoomer

Good stuff. I love that first shot.

squirl033

Ron, your Milky Way shots are always amazing, and this one's no exception. one of these days, i'm gonna get me one of those... though i fear i'll have to wait for a newer mark... my poor ol' 5D just doesn't have the high-ISO capability, and i get WAY too much noise... nice to know Sunrise is open, maybe i'll try to get up there next week while i'm "between opportunities"...

dlplumer

Especially love the Yogi shot, bro. How close did you get?

Andy

Since you shaved you need a new avatar, yo. I know a few photographers that could take a portrait of you.
Love the shots.

redleash

Thanks for the info, Ron! Sorry if I implied you did your blending automatically, didn't mean that. I think I cringed initially at the idea of "hand" blending 19 exposures! I will read through your instructions--thanks again for the link.

bryanj87

One more vote for swoopies! Nice series of shots as usual.

Emancipator

Would a Canon Timer Remote Controller TC-80N3 work for such continuous shots? So there are settings for total # of exposures and continuous, time per exposure, and a delay/no delay setting? Sorry for all the questions!

coscorrosa

zoomer wrote: »

Good stuff. I love that first shot.

Thanks!

squirl033 wrote: »

Ron, your Milky Way shots are always amazing, and this one's no exception. one of these days, i'm gonna get me one of those... though i fear i'll have to wait for a newer mark... my poor ol' 5D just doesn't have the high-ISO capability, and i get WAY too much noise... nice to know Sunrise is open, maybe i'll try to get up there next week while i'm "between opportunities"...

Milky Way shots definitely push the limits of current sensors (even the 5D M2). For the stars in this shot I applied maximum noise reduction in LR3 (stars don't have a lot of detail, they're mostly luminosity and color) and combined it with a lower ISO (400) longer exposed shot of the mountain and foreground.

Even after jumping through all those hoops I'm not sure how it will look printed. I suppose there's one way to find out (have someone buy a print for me!)

dlplumer wrote: »

Especially love the Yogi shot, bro. How close did you get?

I'm not sure if it was Yogi or his sister, but it was about 25 feet. He was just off the shoulder, not on trail. I shot from the car (through the sunroof!).

Andy wrote: »

Since you shaved you need a new avatar, yo. I know a few photographers that could take a portrait of you.
Love the shots.

Thanks Andy! In two weeks I'll have a beard equivalent to the avatar so no worries!

redleash wrote: »

Thanks for the info, Ron! Sorry if I implied you did your blending automatically, didn't mean that. I think I cringed initially at the idea of "hand" blending 19 exposures! I will read through your instructions--thanks again for the link.

No problem Lauren, I didn't take it that you implied that (and even if you did, it wouldn't matter!).

bryanj87 wrote: »

One more vote for swoopies! Nice series of shots as usual.

Thanks man!

Emancipator wrote: »

Would a Canon Timer Remote Controller TC-80N3 work for such continuous shots? So there are settings for total # of exposures and continuous, time per exposure, and a delay/no delay setting? Sorry for all the questions!

Yes, that would work. Or you could save $80 and get this which is what I use and does the same thing:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0012H0LQI

wizardry

Outstanding stuff!