My first attempt at shooting the stars...(56k warning)

[DaveLC2]

I was a initially a little disappointed when I saw the results of my attempts to capture the beauty of the night skies in New Zealand back in March. Just today I was doing a little editing with PS. I don't have much experience using it. I just know the basics. I was stunned when I saw the difference a little editing makes Here are some before and after examples. This was my first attempt at trying to shoot stars. The night was amazing and I don't think I've ever seen more stars in the sky in my whole life! Now it makes me wish I spent more time taking more shots that night Let me know what you guys/gals think.

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Dave

[walterick]

These are before and after photoshop? How did photoshopping bring out all those stars?!

Neat shots, photographing the stars has always been fun for me too. You can get more stars to show up by opening your aperature or using a higher iso. Also, if you want your stars not to streak, shoose a shutter no longer than 20 seconds or so. Anything beyond that and you start to get trails (which can be fun too)

Rick

[DaveLC2]

They were brought out mainly by using auto contrast and auto levels. I know my editing skills are crude compared to many on here :blush2: I just went and looked at what I did and the earlier exosure rates were 10 seconds and the middle was 15 seconds and the second half of the bunch were 20 seconds. I didn't even about not going over 20 seconds. I got that part right at least. All were shot at f4 and were spot metering :blush2: I know I could've done more expermenting but my time there was a little limited because of what was going on in the background. It sounded as if there was a slaughter house near by and these cows were making horrible noises and it was really freaky That mixed in with complete darkness by the beach didn't mix too well. I was okay with being there but my wife was really freaked. Go figure because it was her hometown I am working on editing a video so you can all hear the sounds just after those were all shot. Same sounds but I was just finished up with my shoot. My brother-in-law tells me what we were hearing was from nearby place that farms deer. I've NEVER heard deer sound like that before. He should know as he lives there though. I guess we're just going to have to go back for more shots. hehe

Dave

[Frog]

I was wondering how you got the dramatic difference too. Might have to give it a try.

[livin4lax09]

no offense to you, but stars are fairly...bland if you're just shooting them dead on because there's not much to them. They need some point of reference, some landscape. Otherwise, they just look like a bunch of tiny white dots. In your after versions, the edits are so heavy that they are easily noticed as digitally enhanced photos, because they don't look real anymore, and all the different multi-colored pixels start to pop out. Unfortunately the only real neat ways to capture stars and their trails are to shoot VERY long exposures, sometimes of multiple hours on end. try to include some foreground though, and work on your exposures so that you don't have to boost them quite as much in post processing. If this sounds harsh, my apologies, it's just my opinion.

[DaveLC2]

no offense to you, but stars are fairly...bland if you're just shooting them dead on because there's not much to them. They need some point of reference, some landscape. Otherwise, they just look like a bunch of tiny white dots. In your after versions, the edits are so heavy that they are easily noticed as digitally enhanced photos, because they don't look real anymore, and all the different multi-colored pixels start to pop out. Unfortunately the only real neat ways to capture stars and their trails are to shoot VERY long exposures, sometimes of multiple hours on end. try to include some foreground though, and work on your exposures so that you don't have to boost them quite as much in post processing. If this sounds harsh, my apologies, it's just my opinion.

No offensive taken. Thank you for your honest opinion as it was exactly what I was looking for. I know the edits are crude. I need to spend some time trying out stuff on PS. I personally don't like how they look over enhanced either. I was amazed at what else was in each photo. Thanks again for your honest opinion.

Dave