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Stars with OM-D

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kiri

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I just tried to take a pic of the starry night sky, and have to say that the new timer and bulb live update feature is REALLY useful for long exposure shooting. No more guess work!

But I also have a question. Does anyone know how I can get better star shots with my m43 gear? Specifically, how can I capture the stars without introducing a bunch of noise (which seems to have happened to me a bit here)?

Settings were:
ISO 200, F4 Manual focus. Using 9-18mm oly lens.





--
http://mindboxing.wordpress.com/
http://500px.com/kiri
http://www.flickr.com/photos/memoki/
Google+: http://plus.ly/kirin
 
kiri said:
I just tried to take a pic of the starry night sky, and have to say that the new timer and bulb live update feature is REALLY useful for long exposure shooting. No more guess work!

But I also have a question. Does anyone know how I can get better star shots with my m43 gear? Specifically, how can I capture the stars without introducing a bunch of noise (which seems to have happened to me a bit here)?
Click to expand...
I recall needing ISO 1600 and up to 30 seconds for such a study in general - ideally a shorter exposure would be desired (to avoid streaking from Earth's rotation), not having a tracking mount. The resulting noise is part of the challenge to clean up.

A tracking mount would be optimal for the best opportunity, though.

--
...Bob, NYC
http://www.bobtullis.com

"Well, sometimes the magic works. . . Sometimes, it doesn't." - Little Big Man
.
 
kiri said:
But I also have a question. Does anyone know how I can get better star shots with my m43 gear? Specifically, how can I capture the stars without introducing a bunch of noise (which seems to have happened to me a bit here)?
Click to expand...
I've never really tried star shots with m4/3 but I can give you a few pointers in general.

For starters noise in long exposures is largely a product of a hot sensor. If you want as clean a shot as possible turn your camera off beforehand and let it cool down. Doing something like recording a long HD movie before hand is bound to give you a noisey shot (not saying you've been doing anything like that, just an extreme example).

If you don't mind the wait time let your camera do a dark frame reduction (you made no comment as to whether or not you did one in this pic).

With my canon S95 I get great star shots with ISO 400, f2.8 and a 15s exposure time. These settings (or equivilent) would have clearly blown the foreground in your shot, at which point I'd consider doing 2 exposures and merging them.
 
I have some with one of the Pens, but not nearly as nice as these with the DSLR (that's part of the equation, but the quality of the night sky also was different) - the point is the exposure specs:

31s f2.8 ISO 6400 16mm





Should be interesting this summer with the E-M5.

--
...Bob, NYC
http://www.bobtullis.com

"Well, sometimes the magic works. . . Sometimes, it doesn't." - Little Big Man
.
 
Tell me those aren't the infamous Fuji ORBs. Arrrrgh!
--
42
 
dmarko said:
Found this in my bookmarks. I hope it helps ...
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1041&message=39206958
Click to expand...
This is a good link.

I was going to reply here but I've already replied in that thread so I refer anyone interested to that reply. I'll quote one of several paragraphs from my post there:
dmarko said:
But try various focal lengths and ISOs, the only things you can do wrong is to use exposures below a second or long focal lengths. Without a tracking mount you will likely have to use some form of noise reduction anyway, so try high ISOs and try to process the results (I'm not a fan of post processing myself but I do it with astrophotos since they are so challenging).
Click to expand...
--
http://flickr.com/photos/iskender
 
Bob Tullis said:
A tracking mount would be optimal for the best opportunity, though.
Click to expand...
Years ago I used a very simple tracking mount for astrophotography with moderate focal length lenses (around 135mm). Its called a "barn door mount", and you can make one in an hour, at a cost of less than $20.

http://www.homebuiltastronomy.com/barndoor/index.htm

One of these can give you decent tracking for about 10 minute exposures, depending on the AFOV you are using. There are variants of the barn door that can give good tracking for up to 45 minutes, but they are more complex.

I'll otherwise echo the advice others are giving: higher sensitivity, widest aperture you can work at, and dark frame subtraction. Manual lenses can be great for this sort of work.

--
God loves the noise just as much as the signal.
 
You will never, ever get an excellent pic of stars with terrestrial lights nearby, let alone in the frame of the photo (!).

2. Get high and dry.

You don't need to make a pilgrimage to a New Mexico mountaintop to photograph the Milky Way. Use weather forecasts to choose the clearest days with the lowest possible humidity index (tip: very cold air has very low humidity) and get a little higher in altitude if you have that option.

3. Don't expose for too long.

Stars move. The longer you expose the more they will look like streaks rather than points. A wide aperture and (if necessary) higher ISO would be a good idea.

Good luck!
 
Very pleasant and good image, thank you

--
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

God is the tangential point between zero and infinity.

Imagination is more important than knowledge.

God always take the simplest way.
 
One thing to try is to take a series of shorter exposures and use exposure stacking to merge the images. There are free and pay programs on the net that will do the stacking for you.

Not only will the shorter exposures have less noise in each image, the stacking will average out what noise there is.
 
That's quite resourceful - and just plain neat!

I've bookmarked it for when I can put some attention to it. Thanks, awfully much. :)

--
...Bob, NYC
http://www.bobtullis.com

"Well, sometimes the magic works. . . Sometimes, it doesn't." - Little Big Man
.
 
Hi, thanks for your advice.
Could you tell me what a "dark frame reduction" that you refer to is?

I will try again tonight...
Dheorl said:
kiri said:
But I also have a question. Does anyone know how I can get better star shots with my m43 gear? Specifically, how can I capture the stars without introducing a bunch of noise (which seems to have happened to me a bit here)?
Click to expand...
I've never really tried star shots with m4/3 but I can give you a few pointers in general.

For starters noise in long exposures is largely a product of a hot sensor. If you want as clean a shot as possible turn your camera off beforehand and let it cool down. Doing something like recording a long HD movie before hand is bound to give you a noisey shot (not saying you've been doing anything like that, just an extreme example).

If you don't mind the wait time let your camera do a dark frame reduction (you made no comment as to whether or not you did one in this pic).

With my canon S95 I get great star shots with ISO 400, f2.8 and a 15s exposure time. These settings (or equivilent) would have clearly blown the foreground in your shot, at which point I'd consider doing 2 exposures and merging them.
Click to expand...
--
http://mindboxing.wordpress.com/
http://500px.com/kiri
http://www.flickr.com/photos/memoki/
Google+: http://plus.ly/kirin
 
Thanks Tim, right now I'm just on my parents property, so I don't have many options with location, but I'm just trying to see what I can do. I'll try some more tonight.
Tim F 101 said:
You will never, ever get an excellent pic of stars with terrestrial lights nearby, let alone in the frame of the photo (!).

2. Get high and dry.

You don't need to make a pilgrimage to a New Mexico mountaintop to photograph the Milky Way. Use weather forecasts to choose the clearest days with the lowest possible humidity index (tip: very cold air has very low humidity) and get a little higher in altitude if you have that option.

3. Don't expose for too long.

Stars move. The longer you expose the more they will look like streaks rather than points. A wide aperture and (if necessary) higher ISO would be a good idea.

Good luck!
Click to expand...
--
http://mindboxing.wordpress.com/
http://500px.com/kiri
http://www.flickr.com/photos/memoki/
Google+: http://plus.ly/kirin
 
Thanks, I'll do some research into this.

I see a lot of amazing star photos and time lapse (usually taken with the 5dmk2). Is there something that we are limited by with m43 or is there a different technique they use?

It seems like m43 can't really handle long exposures very well. Or is that true with the FF cams too and they do something to compensate or in PP?
Stefan Sobol said:
One thing to try is to take a series of shorter exposures and use exposure stacking to merge the images. There are free and pay programs on the net that will do the stacking for you.

Not only will the shorter exposures have less noise in each image, the stacking will average out what noise there is.
Click to expand...
--
http://mindboxing.wordpress.com/
http://500px.com/kiri
http://www.flickr.com/photos/memoki/
Google+: http://plus.ly/kirin
 
kiri said:
Thanks, I'll do some research into this.

I see a lot of amazing star photos and time lapse (usually taken with the 5dmk2). Is there something that we are limited by with m43 or is there a different technique they use?

It seems like m43 can't really handle long exposures very well. Or is that true with the FF cams too and they do something to compensate or in PP?
Click to expand...
I can't comment on the newest 16MP+ sensors..but historically it's like this: the M43 sensors are really quite similar to APS-C and have decent noise performance... except if you do longer exposures, then they'll be significantly worse.

But if you turn on dark frame subtraction in the camera menu it will be better, and if you expose for no longer than one or two minutes then the output should be fine.

Any camera will struggle here without a tracking mount, so the sensor isn't really the limiting factor. You're photographing very dim, moving objects: you will inevitably have noise.
--
http://flickr.com/photos/iskender
 
kiri said:
Hi, thanks for your advice.
Could you tell me what a "dark frame reduction" that you refer to is?

I will try again tonight...
Click to expand...
In Oly speak in the menus, "Noise Reduction" set at Auto allows dark frame subtraction for exposures of 4 seconds or longer.

The usual exposure is followed by an equally timed exposure but with the shutter closed. This reveals the pixels that heat up more during the long exposure randomly scattered about, and those are mapped out of the actual exposure thus lessening the noise quite a lot.

Problem is that a 30 second exposure now takes 60 seconds, but is worth the wait.

Regards........... Guy
 
Ahh okay, thanks guys. Yep, my camera was set up like that already. In fact there is a setting of low medium and high (i set to high) for NR.

I had another try last night. Its a little better, but I'm still not too happy with the amount of noise. I also seem to keep underexposing the shots. Even though it looks well exposed on the screen of the EM-5, when I take it on the computer, it is much darker. I lifted this shot about 2 stops in LR4...

Is it worth looking at the histogram on the camera when taking this kind of shot? (I assumed it wouldn't really be accurate because of the nature of the shot).

This time I shot with samyang FE @F3.5 ISO1000.

I would like to expose higher next time, but I'm not sure what else I can raise without getting too much noise, or star movement.





--
http://mindboxing.wordpress.com/
http://500px.com/kiri
http://www.flickr.com/photos/memoki/
Google+: http://plus.ly/kirin
 
kiri said:
Ahh okay, thanks guys. Yep, my camera was set up like that already. In fact there is a setting of low medium and high (i set to high) for NR.

I had another try last night. Its a little better, but I'm still not too happy with the amount of noise. I also seem to keep underexposing the shots. Even though it looks well exposed on the screen of the EM-5, when I take it on the computer, it is much darker. I lifted this shot about 2 stops in LR4...

Is it worth looking at the histogram on the camera when taking this kind of shot? (I assumed it wouldn't really be accurate because of the nature of the shot).

This time I shot with samyang FE @F3.5 ISO1000.

I would like to expose higher next time, but I'm not sure what else I can raise without getting too much noise, or star movement.



Click to expand...
For a single exposure I think that that's good material to work with. Noise will be something to contend with without getting a bit more sophisticated (stacking or rotational mount), just how much of it will become unmanageable is the question. Take her down to a depth of ISO 3200 - lets see how she handles the pressure at 30 seconds.

Nice blackout in effect, duly noted. I'd venture a goes the lightness of the sky in general is nearly light pollution. But still, not bad at all. As you get accustomed, you might consider a light in the back of the house or something of that nature to feature the trees somewhat (even if with wind, could be quite interesting).

--
...Bob, NYC
http://www.bobtullis.com

"Well, sometimes the magic works. . . Sometimes, it doesn't." - Little Big Man
.
 
"It's. . . full of stars."

--
...Bob, NYC
http://www.bobtullis.com

"Well, sometimes the magic works. . . Sometimes, it doesn't." - Little Big Man
.
 
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