Desert Dedication

Desert Dedication
___________________
This photo was a trek worth detailing. Death Valley has some of the darkest night skies and is designated as t...
Read more

Desert Dedication
___________________
This photo was a trek worth detailing. Death Valley has some of the darkest night skies and is designated as the third and largest International Dark Sky Park.They have also reduced unnecessary lighting, pointed some lighting down and use yellow lights in place of bright white ones. I arrived at the dunes around 5:00PM and stayed until 9:00AM the next morning. The stars provided just enough light to navigate the dunes, some of which are 100 feet tall. Hiking up the dunes is a mission in itself. Your foot sinks halfway up your calf into the fine sand. It’s basically 1 step forward two steps back unless you find the sweet spots. Trying to hike up with my bag that weighs 50+ pounds didn’t help. After about three hours of wandering I found this pristine dune with no footprints that would be under the core of the Milky Way when it began to rise at about 12:42AM. To get the final image I used a Platypod tripod which sits level on the ground to give some focus on the sand. An intervelometer was set with a 20 second delay and to take a 30 second exposure every 10 seconds. Basically, I just ran around the dune far away from the top and then climbed back up so I wouldn’t leave my own prints in the sand. The Milky way was taken at the same level, but with the Ioptron Sky Tracker to allow for the one minute tracked exposure to avoid blur in the stars. Later in the night my camera fell off the tripod while I was hiking and got covered in sand. The zoom/focus rings sound like a cement mixer when I turn them. My bag also rolled down the dune at one point once the wind kicked in and I had to chase it for about 20 feet before I caught up with it. My boots, pants and camera bag are still filled with sand. All worth it for my first Milky Way shot of this season!

Settings:
Foreground: 235 seconds | 15mm | f/ 2.8 | ISO 2000
Silhouette: 30 seconds | 15mm | f/ 2.8 | ISO 6400
Milky Way: 60 seconds | 24mm | f/ 2.8 | ISO 3200

Gear: @nikonusa D750, @platypod _tripods, Manfrotto 496rc2 Carbon Fiber tripod, Ioptron Sky Tracker Pro, @loweprobags Whistler
Edited in Adobe @photoshop, @lightroom, using @wacom Intuos Pro Small
Read less