I've always wanted to click beautiful pictures of the night sky just like those in the astronomy magazines and websites. But, lack of any sort of measurable amount of experience in astronomy and photography haven't taken me very far, in fact,anywhere at all, towards doing that. But all was about to change, when me and a friend decided to take a trip to South Dakota (wait...what??) to see the Mount Rushmore National Monument (Oh, that's why). I had a fair idea that the monument was sort of away from any big cities, so there was a chance of being under slightly darker skies than what I'm used to seeing in the Detroit Metropolitan area. I took a quick look at Dark Sky Finder (DSF) map (the website I'd bookmarked who knows when!) to find that the monument was a little closer to Rapid City than I had expected. But nearby there was the Badlands National Park (cool name, if you ask me) to the east and the Devil's Tower National Monument (cooler still...) not far off in the north west of the Mount Rushmore. And those were quite literally in the middle of nowhere, and the DSF map had them shaded grey! That is almost as dark as it gets! That got me super excited and the first thing that came to my mind was - this is my chance to have a go at astrophotography.
The idea of capturing stunning photographs of the night sky was cool and exciting, but I needed to get my hands on a key piece of equipment - The Camera! That brought me right down on the ground again. The thought of spending $500 on a decent digital SLR camera just for one trip, without knowing anything about basic photography, wasn't something I was willing to entertain. But, all hope was not lost as I turned to man's best friend - the internet! A quick search pointed me to a local camera shop which rented out digital SLR cameras and lenses for a decent charge. Voila! Within my meager budget I got my hands on a Canon EOS Rebel T3 and a 18-200 mm lens to go with it. And while I was thinking getting a camera was tough, learning how to use it in a day was a totally different ball game. I had never used anything beyond a basic point and shoot before this (I'm not much of a photographer, and on the rare occasions that I've felt like taking pictures, my iPhone has been more than sufficient). But I soon found out that the internet (again to the rescue) was rife with little tutorials on some of the basics of digital SLR photography which were enough to get me started. About a week before, I was at my Astronomy Club's (University Lowbrow Astronomers) meeting at the end of which, Brian Ottum showed us a couple of stunning pictures of the Milky Way he took with a digital SLR camera at a National Park in Utah. So, I thought it would be best to ask him for some tips on how to use a camera under dark skies. He was extremely prompt, very helpful and knew exactly what I was trying to do. After a quick phone conversation with him I was feeling quite confident about shooting some stars!
Alright, so, I had my camera, I had learnt how to use it (umm, sort of...) and was ready to drive a 1000 plus miles to put all of it to use under some sublime skies. Easy peasy, right? Ha ha, not so much! "Did you check the weather, Mr. Photographer?", the little voice in my head blurted out. Darn you little voice in my head! So back on the internet with weather.com, Weather Underground, AccuWeather, NOAA... ABC... XYZ and all came back with the same answer - Perfect Weather Conditions. Woo Hoo! With all the elements coming together including perfect weather, even God couldn't have written a better script. So now I was, finally, all set to embark upon my little trip.
A day and a half and exactly 1200 miles later, I was at my hotel in Rapid City, South Dakota. On my way, while my friend was driving at night, about 50 odd miles from our hotel, I peeked out of the window toward the sky and it was filled with stars. I got a taste of what was to come the following nights under the sky. So, in the hotel room, at the planning table, the itinerary for the next day was decided - Mount Rushmore in the morning, surrounding scenic areas in the afternoon, the Devil's Tower in the evening and night sky photography there until we could barely stay awake to drive back. The plan went pretty well, we were at the right place at the right times of the day to enjoy the monuments and the natural beauty around. Finally, reached the Devil's tower just in time before the visitor center was about to close. There was some time before the sun would go down and we took the opportunity to walk around the tower and see it from all sides. It is a truly remarkable geological formation towering some 800 feet in the middle of nowhere. The different hues of yellow and orange that the tower donned because of the sunlight was an absolutely spectacular sight to behold.
As the setting sun somehow made the scene even more beautiful than it already was, we decided to get dinner and find a place to set up the camera. Just after dinner we were treated to the sight of Saturn, shining like a diamond and setting in the western sky. That was my first chance to capture an astro-photo. After several attempts I couldn't get the right settings on the camera to capture any meaningful photographs of the ringed planet. Bummer! That didn't help my confidence. In fact, I became more skeptical of my limited ability to take photos of the night sky.
We went back to the location we picked to set up the camera. The sun had fully set by then and the sky was full of stars. The Milky Way was shining majestically. The amount of detail visible, the gas and the dust lanes was simply phenomenal. Only if I could capture all this beauty on the sensor of the camera! I tried several more times to get a decent picture of our gorgeous galaxy, but not one photograph was worth keeping. Too little exposure time...out of focus...too much aperture...high ISO...low ISO... I was getting frustrated. My friend, who is not at all an astronomy enthusiast, had gone past frustration long before and was begging me to pack up and head back. So, I thought, one last chance and I could take a long exposure shot for star trails with the Devil's Tower in the foreground. I could picture it in my mind and seemed like a brilliant idea. With everything I could remember about capturing star trails, I set it up, plugged the remote shutter in and one..two...three...CLICK! After about 25 more minutes of continuous CLICK, I decided to see the results.
Finally, nice star trails with the big tower in the center of the frame! There was some 'noise' in the image, but at that time I didn't really care. I had my first picture which I could put in an article and write about it!
Day two was fully dedicated to visiting the Badlands National Park. Another day in the midst of nature's breathtaking ability to carve out a landscape out of sedimentary deposits and a whole lot of wind. After spending the entire day wandering around the entire park, the time of the sunset brought out some familiar members in the sky. From hundreds of millions of miles away, Saturn was shining brightly again in the western sky. And this time I HAD to capture it in my camera. Once again I fiddled with the settings on the camera and gave it another shot.
Ah Ha! Gotcha Saturn!
The feeling of being able to see and photograph a distant world, even if its just a point of light in the vast black-blue sky, is something truly amazing.
The sun had barely set and the big dipper was high up in the sky in all its glory. As if the stunning natural beauty on earth wasn't enough, the heavens had put on quite a show after nightfall. The Milky Way seemed even brighter than last night and I had thought last night's was the brightest I had ever seen. So while I was engrossed and breathless just looking at the sky, my friend reminded me, "Hey, you could try taking a picture of the Milky Way again". So I turned my camera to the south pointing it towards the center of our galaxy and started taking 30 second exposure pictures adjusting the aperture and ISO each time and after a few shots I could finally see the magnificence in the sky come onto the camera display.
It kept getting better and better and I was absolutely ecstatic! Don't they say failures are the stepping stones to success? They're probably right!
I left the Badlands National Park that night feeling extremely happy and satisfied. The images would definitely need some (actually, quite a bit of) processing in photoshop...which I don't know how to...yet. That's the next step in my learning process. But at the moment, I would say not too bad for a first try - not just with astrophotography, but using a digital SLR itself! Sure these aren't the best photographs ever taken, but for me its the process, the learning involved and the joy of all of it that counts. At this point, Saturn might look like a dot in my pictures or Andromeda is just a faint smudge, but its about appreciating that I am able to capture the light which has traveled millions and millions of miles. In this small trip I witnessed some of the darkest skies in the US and could finally comprehend how much the heavens has to offer even for a naked eye observer. Will I be giving astrophotography another 'shot'? Absolutely!
The idea of capturing stunning photographs of the night sky was cool and exciting, but I needed to get my hands on a key piece of equipment - The Camera! That brought me right down on the ground again. The thought of spending $500 on a decent digital SLR camera just for one trip, without knowing anything about basic photography, wasn't something I was willing to entertain. But, all hope was not lost as I turned to man's best friend - the internet! A quick search pointed me to a local camera shop which rented out digital SLR cameras and lenses for a decent charge. Voila! Within my meager budget I got my hands on a Canon EOS Rebel T3 and a 18-200 mm lens to go with it. And while I was thinking getting a camera was tough, learning how to use it in a day was a totally different ball game. I had never used anything beyond a basic point and shoot before this (I'm not much of a photographer, and on the rare occasions that I've felt like taking pictures, my iPhone has been more than sufficient). But I soon found out that the internet (again to the rescue) was rife with little tutorials on some of the basics of digital SLR photography which were enough to get me started. About a week before, I was at my Astronomy Club's (University Lowbrow Astronomers) meeting at the end of which, Brian Ottum showed us a couple of stunning pictures of the Milky Way he took with a digital SLR camera at a National Park in Utah. So, I thought it would be best to ask him for some tips on how to use a camera under dark skies. He was extremely prompt, very helpful and knew exactly what I was trying to do. After a quick phone conversation with him I was feeling quite confident about shooting some stars!
Alright, so, I had my camera, I had learnt how to use it (umm, sort of...) and was ready to drive a 1000 plus miles to put all of it to use under some sublime skies. Easy peasy, right? Ha ha, not so much! "Did you check the weather, Mr. Photographer?", the little voice in my head blurted out. Darn you little voice in my head! So back on the internet with weather.com, Weather Underground, AccuWeather, NOAA... ABC... XYZ and all came back with the same answer - Perfect Weather Conditions. Woo Hoo! With all the elements coming together including perfect weather, even God couldn't have written a better script. So now I was, finally, all set to embark upon my little trip.
A day and a half and exactly 1200 miles later, I was at my hotel in Rapid City, South Dakota. On my way, while my friend was driving at night, about 50 odd miles from our hotel, I peeked out of the window toward the sky and it was filled with stars. I got a taste of what was to come the following nights under the sky. So, in the hotel room, at the planning table, the itinerary for the next day was decided - Mount Rushmore in the morning, surrounding scenic areas in the afternoon, the Devil's Tower in the evening and night sky photography there until we could barely stay awake to drive back. The plan went pretty well, we were at the right place at the right times of the day to enjoy the monuments and the natural beauty around. Finally, reached the Devil's tower just in time before the visitor center was about to close. There was some time before the sun would go down and we took the opportunity to walk around the tower and see it from all sides. It is a truly remarkable geological formation towering some 800 feet in the middle of nowhere. The different hues of yellow and orange that the tower donned because of the sunlight was an absolutely spectacular sight to behold.
 |
| Some non-astro-photos: A sincere attempt to capture nature's magic. |
We went back to the location we picked to set up the camera. The sun had fully set by then and the sky was full of stars. The Milky Way was shining majestically. The amount of detail visible, the gas and the dust lanes was simply phenomenal. Only if I could capture all this beauty on the sensor of the camera! I tried several more times to get a decent picture of our gorgeous galaxy, but not one photograph was worth keeping. Too little exposure time...out of focus...too much aperture...high ISO...low ISO... I was getting frustrated. My friend, who is not at all an astronomy enthusiast, had gone past frustration long before and was begging me to pack up and head back. So, I thought, one last chance and I could take a long exposure shot for star trails with the Devil's Tower in the foreground. I could picture it in my mind and seemed like a brilliant idea. With everything I could remember about capturing star trails, I set it up, plugged the remote shutter in and one..two...three...CLICK! After about 25 more minutes of continuous CLICK, I decided to see the results.
Finally, nice star trails with the big tower in the center of the frame! There was some 'noise' in the image, but at that time I didn't really care. I had my first picture which I could put in an article and write about it!
Day two was fully dedicated to visiting the Badlands National Park. Another day in the midst of nature's breathtaking ability to carve out a landscape out of sedimentary deposits and a whole lot of wind. After spending the entire day wandering around the entire park, the time of the sunset brought out some familiar members in the sky. From hundreds of millions of miles away, Saturn was shining brightly again in the western sky. And this time I HAD to capture it in my camera. Once again I fiddled with the settings on the camera and gave it another shot.
 |
| The barely visible little white dot in the sky just to the right from center is Saturn. |
The feeling of being able to see and photograph a distant world, even if its just a point of light in the vast black-blue sky, is something truly amazing.
The sun had barely set and the big dipper was high up in the sky in all its glory. As if the stunning natural beauty on earth wasn't enough, the heavens had put on quite a show after nightfall. The Milky Way seemed even brighter than last night and I had thought last night's was the brightest I had ever seen. So while I was engrossed and breathless just looking at the sky, my friend reminded me, "Hey, you could try taking a picture of the Milky Way again". So I turned my camera to the south pointing it towards the center of our galaxy and started taking 30 second exposure pictures adjusting the aperture and ISO each time and after a few shots I could finally see the magnificence in the sky come onto the camera display.
It kept getting better and better and I was absolutely ecstatic! Don't they say failures are the stepping stones to success? They're probably right!
I left the Badlands National Park that night feeling extremely happy and satisfied. The images would definitely need some (actually, quite a bit of) processing in photoshop...which I don't know how to...yet. That's the next step in my learning process. But at the moment, I would say not too bad for a first try - not just with astrophotography, but using a digital SLR itself! Sure these aren't the best photographs ever taken, but for me its the process, the learning involved and the joy of all of it that counts. At this point, Saturn might look like a dot in my pictures or Andromeda is just a faint smudge, but its about appreciating that I am able to capture the light which has traveled millions and millions of miles. In this small trip I witnessed some of the darkest skies in the US and could finally comprehend how much the heavens has to offer even for a naked eye observer. Will I be giving astrophotography another 'shot'? Absolutely!
