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Star Dust in your eyes and cool sand under foot with a moon rise and a receding tide for a day time walk all fresh and salty air. This is a last shot of the nig...
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Star Dust in your eyes and cool sand under foot with a moon rise and a receding tide for a day time walk all fresh and salty air. This is a last shot of the night with the first glow of light from the sun on the horizon at left and the yellow glow of lights from a hotel behind the trees (yellow tungsten lights for turtles not to come inland after hatching).
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cameraSONY ILCE-7S

settings ISO 3200 Shutter 25/1 

upload_dateMar, 2016

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9 Comments |
barbaramillesrobinson PRO+
 
barbaramillesrobinson April 05, 2016
Stunning scene. Voted Adventureland. Good Luck!
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 April 05, 2016
Thank You for the kind comment and your time to vote. It is a nice quite place.
kaceyhansell
 
kaceyhansell April 20, 2016
Absolutely stunning picture. Amazing!! I love it ????
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 April 20, 2016
Thank You SO Much!! Yes Amazing what my camera will capture. Earlier I went out to see if this could be captured and when I saw the result on my camera I started running from spot to spot. This is the last of 100 images that morning as the the pink/red horizon glow marked the end of the night as the Milky Way started to fade in the morning light. The moon was the last quarter of light not full rising after the MW that Morning. NO PS'ing just Lr.
anthonymannion PRO+
 
anthonymannion May 14, 2016
stunning in every way
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 May 14, 2016
Thank You Anthony
kathyk_abq
 
kathyk_abq May 14, 2016
Absolutely stunning! Was this all in one shot? You captured this moment perfectly!
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 May 14, 2016
Yes, No Photoshopping! This is the last of the crescent moon rising below the Milky Way looking like a full moon with a 25 second capture. I have 50 more not processed yet at different other driftwood trees, I keep moving all morning.
mjhousto
 
mjhousto June 15, 2016
Congratulations on your selection as a finalist! Good luck!
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 June 18, 2016
Thank You So Much mijhousto
asia_krasuska
 
asia_krasuska June 19, 2016
That is such an amazing image! Thank you for sharing & congratulations on the finalist selection!
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 July 07, 2016
Thank You Very Much Asia, Only with ViewBug can you really share a image!
Fordboyutah
 
Fordboyutah April 08, 2017
Beautiful
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 April 09, 2017
Thank You Fordboyutah, to the human eye it was really dark.
kerry__
 
kerry__ June 07, 2017
Magnificent capture!
adamlbourquin
 
adamlbourquin June 22, 2017
Very nice shot!
auxgen4 Platinum
auxgen4 June 23, 2017
adamlbourquin Thank You, Just staying till the last moment.

Submitted to Photo Contests

Tags

#Cosmos Rise #Dark Horse Nebula #moon rise
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Behind The Lens

Location

Driftwood Beach Jekyll Island State Park Georgia. I discovered this place on a whim last year when I started capturing the Milky Way trying to find some dark skies in my area that I thought would be safe for night photography while alone. For a couple of years I would go out and just do sunrises at the different driftwoods or the awesome eye soothing sunsets while staying at the campground near by. Here a photographer will never put the camera down day or night.

Time

This was four days before the new moon March 5, 2016 at 0530 after a long morning of capturing the Milky Way at different locations on the beach. It was the beginning of the Blue Hour just as the Venus Girdle started to glow on the horizon unseen except on the camera screen after a 25 second exposure with the Milky Way fading into a cobalt blue sky just barely seen with my eyes, that little cloud like puff seen floating across the sky on a very clear night.

Lighting

This beach has lighting that is a gift to a night photographer. The Milky Way comes up in the southeast sky and moves to the south then southwest, so facing south you have St. Simons Island in back of you with light glow and a lighthouse light illuminating the driftwood and beach and after you get your night vision you can see small light spots sometimes right next to you like a spot light from above but when you look up nothing but stars! But getting a +.7 ev in Manual Mode and then in post lowering Exposure will help with noise because you will be at ISO 3200 to 6400 and above (if really dark foreground). Here you do not need to illuminate your foreground and I like a bright photo not a dark print so noise control has to be thought of.

Equipment

My camera the A7s, lens Rokinon 14mm f/2.8 @ f/2.8 and a light Manfrotto tripod, other important things insulated rubber hunting boots or waterproof snake boots, beach sand in March is cold and large puddles remain as the tide goes out and with turtle eggs all about large snakes have been known to wander down the beach. Even in May the nights are quite cold so long handles and layered clothing and a photographer's vest to carry another lens (and a clear trash bag to change it in) I have tested up to three lenses a night and extra headlamps, also it has a couple of big pockets to carry an iPad (I use it to wifi link to the camera to view jpegs on a larger screen). Use your PhotoPills/SkySafari apps on the iPad not your phone they will drain a phone's battery, you may need it! Oh! and for us who wear bifocals, wear the the bifocals not the progressives - stars and lights will be sharper at night.

Inspiration

The beach is the inspiration, first you use the PhotoPills app to see where the Milky Way will be seen and its rise time. Next while the time of the new moon arrives you watch every weather cast and look at every weather app seven day forecast for clear skies and high pressures areas with a cold front. I drove 100 miles and stayed in a hotel 4 nights with clear skies each night. This morning I went out before the moonrise and captured for two hours but the tide rises as the moon rises up to the horizon and having experienced a super moon high tide left and headed back to my hotel but on the way back saw the moonrise stopped got out and captured the MW with the moonrise on another beach and quickly headed back to driftwood beach. The tide starting to go out I set up and and tried to capture again and it was great and colorful (I set the camera settings to get the best jpeg and take both jpeg and RAW). After that I walked and set up on every tree the rest of the morning (two more hours). With the 14mm you can stand five to ten yards in front of a tree and get it all in making it look huge or fill the frame all the while getting a large amount of horizon. This capture one of my last was next to the tide and with aperture mode was getting still water not blurry and the tree one of my favorites but with the wide angle I got all the other driftwood lined up on the beach. I just walk and compose and am surprised with every capture I see on the camera, it is the magic in the night air and great camera programmers in this digital age.

Editing

I do not have PS just Lr with some Nik software, So highlights/whites left and shadows/darks right - Clarity/Vibrance/Saturation right, tone curve medium contrast then Nik Dfine and Color Efex Pro. Nice now that Lr has the Lens corrections for the Rokinon lenses you get a nice straight horizon and trees that go straight up (better). A light contrast/darken/temp brush can get rid of some bright skies. The Milky Way temp is 3890 for it's color, I reset temp to Lr Auto then do a temp brush across the Milky Way to bring out the colors of it. To get the serpent part (spiral) and bring out the Dark Horse Nebula a lite darken brush (and some other sliders). The Galactic Center side a lighten brush and the Galactic Center the no saturation brush or tooth whitening brush to make it cloud white. Before you go taking photo's in tungsten, study the colors of gases in the night sky at high altitudes, so when you select a temp setting try and keep the stars white not blue. The orange light at the right is from a hotel on the beach and the light is so baby turtles go out to sea, it is one of the hardest temps to work with, practice taking shots down your street adjusting the camera temp if it is a problem at your site of capture, it is seen here only in a long exposure. But getting the MW colors on the camera screen in AWB using the camera's different mode settings gives you the best starting point when you start PP'ing that RAW file and a lot of times the camera gets everything right (great camera programmers doing good for us).

In my camera bag

You have to be in the bag also, know the magic box and it's settings to get a perfect jpeg. For this capture just the A7s and Rokinon 14mm f/2.8 but that was before I got the Sony 10-18 and use at 12mm-16mm f/4 not as much coma. You do not need to go wide a Sony 16-35mm f/3.5 is a great lens with no coma. A 35mm or 50mm f/1.4 or f/2.8 will do great. Just remember 500 divided by focal length gives you the shutter speed. Also I have gotten the same results with my Canon T2i and the EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5 equal to 16mm. Leave camera noise reduction on, it is just another 30"'s till you see what you have. If you get those little red/grey pixels just change the date on your camera by two months and return to correct date this will remap your pixels, Lr takes good care of them upon import but this way you do not need to send your camera back for repair. Do a sensor clean and remap pixels before every adventure and learn to focus on a star at + 10 magnification and lonelyspeck.com has a neat little tool for that. A check off list to do before a shot, like when wiping the mosture from the lens the focus ring will move or your f/stop is not set right. Use AWB the camera jpeg may get it right and you will have a great place to start PPing a RAW file.

Feedback

For Milky Way capture get the PhotoPills and SkySafari apps. Read all PhotoPills articles and the one english video. Lonelyspeck.com website has the best info and equipment reviews. Watch the weather learn how it moves in your area. As far as dark skies, yes they are best BUT find your darkest and set your camera settings best for night shots, first just shoot ISO 6400/SS30"/f/wide open to see what you can. Once you get a good capture play in aperture and manual (in manual get a +.7ev shot). Lastly have several foreground areas, In February you have one to two hours but in July you have from sunset to sunrise from southeast to southwest and an island is great just drive from place to place and daybreak will be a surprise but a heartbreaker because you have to stop. One week I went from Mobile Alabama (USS Alabama) to St. George Island Fl. to Cedar Key Fl. all clear nights with cloudy days just to see if my ideas for foregrounds were sound. Lastly find a friend or friends to go with you and do not just stand in one spot all night move and get more and more you may only get clear skies but one or two times a year! This month (May) one night two other photographers (from 100 the other 600 miles away) were on the beach and stayed in one spot the whole night, scout your place before hand with your camera and lens map out spots you will be out there 6 to 8 hours not even knowing what time it is until daybreak (it just comes).

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