A Few Astro Pics

Last evening was a crystal-clear, windless night so I grabbed a couple of lenses, my D4 and a remote timer and stepped outside to grab a few shots of the night sky from our driveway. I haven’t done much night photography in the last year or so and it took a little experimenting for the first few frames to eliminate the star trails and get the focus point right on the stars. Hint: use a max-zoomed live view, manual focus, and then tape the focus ring to the lens barrel once you’re satisfied that the stars are sharp enough. Rule of thumb for exposure time – in general I use the “500 rule”  – 500 / focus length of the lens to get the maximum exposure time (in my case 24mm and 14mm, so 20 sec and 30 sec respectively). I was pushing for 30-second exposures at 24mm, but at that exposure the images/stars were showing star trail motion blur due to the earth’s rotation. Photos taken in Le Côty, Neuchâtel. Click on image for larger view.

Equipment used in this post (advertiser links):
[amazon_image id=”B00IMOB5SW” link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]Nikon D4S 16.2 MP CMOS FX Digital SLR with Full 1080p HD Video (Body Only)[/amazon_image]  [amazon_image id=”B0037KM0X0″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]Nikon AF-S FX NIKKOR 24mm f/1.4G ED Fixed Zoom Lens with Auto Focus for Nikon DSLR Cameras[/amazon_image] [amazon_image id=”B000VDCTCI” link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]Nikon AF-S FX NIKKOR 14-24mm f/2.8G ED Zoom Lens with Auto Focus for Nikon DSLR Cameras[/amazon_image]