Darren Addy wrote:
High ISO does not really help you that much... I wouldn't recommend
over 800 ISO. You can leave your shutter open as long as you like
(well, until you start recording the sky fog/background light). Then
you aren't gaining anything by exposing longer because as the stars
get more exposure, so does the background. Your histogram should be
JUST off the left side. In fact, the higher ISO actually hurts you
because you will pick up your skyfog sooner (with a shorter exposure)
and you want long exposures to capture meteors while your shutter is
open. (Murphy's Law of Meteor photography is that the best meteors
will happen while the shutter is closed.)
That is what happened to me last year. An amazing meteor, where my
camera was pointing, while it was doing a darkfield image. However I
will propose a couple of counterpoints. The first is that it doesn't
matter how long the shutter is open, what matters is the duty cycle. You
want the shutter open for the highest percentage of time.
As to ISO, I have found that the meteors are brief and dim, so exposing
longer doesn't make them brighter, it just makes everything around them
brighter. You just want enough sensitivity that they show up well at
the aperture that you can use.
You don't care if the stars are pinpoint or tracks because the meteors
will be long lines that are evident against them. If you ALSO want
pinpoint stars, then you need some sort of a tracker (most of them
require polar alignment).
I've been using my astrotracer.
The most important ingredients are a fast lens and WIDE angle sky
coverage. (A corollary to Murphy's Law of Meteor Photography is that,
if you shutter is open, the best meteors will happen outside your
field of view).
This is one reason that the lens I most want to add to my collection
is the Samyang/Rokinon 16mm f/2.
I want the sigma 18-35/1.8 because being autofocus it would work with my
astrotracer.
On Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 5:53 AM, Knarf<[email protected]> wrote:
Cool!
Cheers,
frank
On 12 August, 2015 3:29:01 AM EDT, Larry Colen<[email protected]> wrote:
I caught one meteor:
http://www.fluidr.com/photos/ellarsee/sets/72157657118069972/
Larry Colen wrote:
It seems as if the Perseids will be in full swing this week. Does
anyone
have any advice borne of experience for photographing them?
I suspect that a lot of short exposures will have the advantage of
running at a higher ISO and making it easier to capture a dimmer
transient event. Then there is the question of darkfield frames.
Astrotracer or not? Optimal focal length?
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