What is wrong with my photo?

ThunderCat

Hello all

I have had a camera for a couple of months now and have been using it for daytime shots and in autofocus mode. My remote control for it arrived in the post a few days ago allowing me to take long exposure shots and I decided tonight would be the night I took my first photo of the night sky. Only problem is the photo is getting completly washed out. I have attached a pic of what the camera is taking and a pic of the camera settings. Extremely grateful if someone can tell me where im going wrong.

ps200306

Are you holding the lens open with the bulb or just triggering a timed exposure? Have you tried gradually reducing the exposure time? Try also reducing the ISO speed to 1600 or 800. As a last resort you could up the F-stop, although keeping as wide an aperture as possible is generally the best idea.

What's the area you're shooting from like? Is that orange colour light pollution, or some kind of lens flare? You seem to have captured some stars, which is a good start, though they don't look very in focus. You've set focus to manual -- is it set at infinity?

ThunderCat

ps200306 wrote: »

Are you holding the lens open with the bulb or just triggering a timed exposure? Have you tried gradually reducing the exposure time? Try also reducing the ISO speed to 1600 or 800. As a last resort you could up the F-stop, although keeping as wide an aperture as possible is generally the best idea.

What's the area you're shooting from like? Is that orange colour light pollution, or some kind of lens flare? You seem to have captured some stars, which is a good start, though they don't look very in focus. You've set focus to manual -- is it set at infinity?

Firstly, thanks for the reply PS200306.

I took the photo by holding my thumb down on the remote sensor for about 20 seconds or so. I didn't actually try altering the settings such as ISO speed etc. as I saw a photo online of a beautiful night sky taken with the same camera as mine (Canon 70d) and as the fella who took the photo also listed the settings for the image so I just put the same settings onto my camera.
I live in a suburb of Dublin that has streetlights everywhere. I took the photo out of the side window of my upstairs landing. The borders you see in the photo are the neighbours roof at the bottom and my window frame at the sides. I don't have a wide angle lens at the moment so I was using my 50mm to shoot it.
I'm kind of feeling a bit stupid right about now because I have a funny feeling that the washed out look to my image is due to the 20+ second exposure allowing the streetlight as well as the starlight to get in. I wasn't facing the streetlight or anything and was pointing the camera quite high in the sky, but the glow would still be there nonetheless I'm sure.
As it was my first photo of the night sky with it I was (unrealistically) expecting better, but could it be something as simple as streetlight that is having that effect on the image?

ps200306

You definitely need to get the window frame out of the picture if you want to achieve success. The reflected light from that is going to totally dominate your image, and also some of that light is clearly bouncing around the inner lens barrel. Although your lens is designed to minimise this, you have to consider how it compares to the miniscule light levels from the stars you are trying to shoot. A magnitude six star -- which you should be easily able to capture with your 50mm lens -- gives an energy flux of about a thousandth of a trillionth of a Watt per square centimetre of lens. It's a miracle of technology that you can photograph this at all but, as you can imagine, you really need to minimise extraneous light. While light pollution of the sky is something you have to live with, make sure you are not seeing any direct light sources or even reflective surfaces. The odd faraway tree or mountain is no problem, but your lit up window frame is a definite no go. I've had some reasonable results with a setup very similar to your own -- a 50mm lens on a Canon 50d. I don't even have a bulb, just the normal shutter release button.

syklops

I live in a suburb of Dublin that has streetlights everywhere. I took the photo out of the side window of my upstairs landing

I'd say thats your problem right there.

Which suburb do you live in?

Mountainsandh

Iso 2000 for 20 seconds, with aperture wide open and light pollution so ?

I think iso is too high, go down to 800 and your image will also benefit from less noise.

Or maybe 1600 Iso rather.

If you go down to 800 you might need to expose a bit longer, but I guess you're trying to avoid that.

Flying Abruptly

The focus seems off, perhaps a stupid question - was the window open? The camera may have been focused on the glass...

Also with a cropped sensor at 50mm, you would expect to see star trailing with a 20sec exposure.

ThunderCat

Thanks for all the replies.

Yes I had the window open fully, so all of the stars that appear in that image were captured without shooting through glass. But light from the street could have been bouncing off the windowsill underneath the open window perhaps or even the window itself and affecting the image. I will fiddle with the settings the next clear night we get and will go out the back garden away from the window. It will still be light polluted in the garden of course but it may make a little bit of difference. Ultimately, I will need to find a darker location to take better shots.
As for the stars being out of focus, I was using manual focus and didn't have the lens properly focused so that was purely down to me and not the camera. I was more concerned at the time that the image was taken as to why the sky wasn't appearing darker. Trial and error with the different ISO levels etc. I suppose.
I'm living in Beaumont by the way.

Mountainsandh

I've taken this one (and a few more on flickr) with iso 1600 and 30 seconds exposure, but my lens will only open to F4.

I don't get much trailing, but then again I'm not zoomed in at all, you're pretty zoomed in on your shot so I would expect more visible trailing.

Also, I'm in a very un-light-polluted area, so I sort of need the 30 seconds. I think your 20 seconds are probably a good bet in your location.

Focus your lens to infinity manually, but then twist it back in a teeny weensy bit from infinity for the shot, especially if you want some framing/foreground to show.

The pic shown here has been processed in lightroom : various adjustments but especially contrast and noise reduction.

[IMG][/img]milky way 11 august 2015 (1 of 1)-2 by Anne L., on Flickr

https://flic.kr/p/whH5yq

ThunderCat

Mountainsandh wrote: »

I've taken this one (and a few more on flickr) with iso 1600 and 30 seconds exposure, but my lens will only open to F4.

I don't get much trailing, but then again I'm not zoomed in at all, you're pretty zoomed in on your shot so I would expect more visible trailing.

Also, I'm in a very un-light-polluted area, so I sort of need the 30 seconds. I think your 20 seconds are probably a good bet in your location.

Focus your lens to infinity manually, but then twist it back in a teeny weensy bit from infinity for the shot, especially if you want some framing/foreground to show.

The pic shown here has been processed in lightroom : various adjustments but especially contrast and noise reduction.

[IMG][/img]milky way 11 august 2015 (1 of 1)-2 by Anne L., on Flickr

https://flic.kr/p/whH5yq

Fantastic Photo. Stunning.

I used a 50mm lens as I don't have anything wider. It's a fairly narrow field of view alright but I don't think I was zoomed in or anything. Just to give you a sense of scale, that's Mirphak in Perseus in the bottom right of the photo. I just wish I took a few more photos, perhaps out in the garden, rather than just the one photo and presuming something was wrong. Hopefully tonight will be clear so I can go out the back and mess around with the settings and see what I can get.

Mountainsandh

Good luck for tonight, doesn't look too bad weather wise here in South East, is the moon going to be a bit too bright though ?

ThunderCat

Well im just back inside after spending a while out in the back garden taking a few shots with different settings. I set the camera up so that I was shooting the tail end of the plough which was just above the shed roof. Im a lot happier now as I focused the lens a bit better and with reducing the exposure time I was getting photos that resembled the night sky. The ones ive attached had exposure times of roughly a second, four seconds and twelve seconds. Im a lot happier now as I can see that my location is playing a big part on how the sky appears. The moon was out too so im excited to see what I can get in a dark location on a moonless night.

Temppe

Quick question for Mountainsandh:

Just above the horizon there seems to be colour banding starting with a reddish brown and turning green above that. Was that colour banding actually there or is it an artifact from Light Room? It looks like it could be a compression artifact but I'm no expert...

Mountainsandh

Temppe wrote: »

Quick question for Mountainsandh:

Just above the horizon there seems to be colour banding starting with a reddish brown and turning green above that. Was that colour banding actually there or is it an artifact from Light Room? It looks like it could be a compression artifact but I'm no expert...

No I think it was there alright, but it's more like a yellow light pollution on haze sort of thing I think. I corrected white balance.

Iancar29

Temppe wrote: »

Quick question for Mountainsandh:

Just above the horizon there seems to be colour banding starting with a reddish brown and turning green above that. Was that colour banding actually there or is it an artifact from Light Room? It looks like it could be a compression artifact but I'm no expert...

Mountainsandh wrote: »

No I think it was there alright, but it's more like a yellow light pollution on haze sort of thing I think. I corrected white balance.

Thats light pollution near the horizon and then air-glow above it.

Mountainsandh

Iancar29 wrote: »

Thats light pollution near the horizon and then air-glow above it.

Yeah, Dungarvan light pollution is to the left, and middle to right there's Cappoquin and probably some from Cork/Middleton away in distance. I would consider my sky very un-light polluted because these are all pretty far away, but the camera picks even the slightest bit of light. Just learned about airglow this week ! I won't try to fix it and just embrace it from now on