Starry, Starry Night

Nikon D70 @ 18mm, 30 mins, f/5.6, ISO 200
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Yeah, it's rubbish, I know. But I wanted to give the whole star trails a go and felt I had to post my first results. I've been waiting for ages for a clear night to try this out, but such a thing seems to be rare these days. It wasn't actually that clear tonight, as you can see from the thin clouds passing by, but I took the shot anyway. I'm treating this as practice for the real thing.

I've seen some awesome star trail pictures, and would love to get a good one some day. It's a lot more difficult than you'd think though. You need to find a good location with something reasonably interesting in the foreground. But something that's not so bright that it'll just blowout with the huge exposure. You also need clear skies and be far away from the city. So while you're in the middle of nowhere taking your picture (probably alone as well) you need to find something to do for 30 mins while you wait for the camera work its magic.

The quality of the image isn't great because it's a 30 minute exposure - quite a lot of noise, and the dead pixels are noticeable. If I ever manage to find a good location for this kind of shot, I'll make a composite of multiple 1-2 minute exposures and stack them. One day...