If you're ever in Death Valley, I strongly suggest the drive to
Rhyolite, NV at night.
Even if you aren't into night photography, it's something everyone
should experience. The town started with 2 people in 1905, in 1907/8
there were 5,000 people living there all looking for gold. Months
later the lack of ore and some poor timing on the part of investors
(Charles M. Schwab) quickly turned Rhyolite into the ghost town that
it is today.
The century old structures combined with billions of visible stars
make for an experience I will never forget. No photograph can
represent what we saw with the naked eye, literally billions of stars.
We saw shooting stars at every turn of head and every color in the
PMS book represented on one giant, celestial canvas.
The making of:
This is a combination of two images.
1. One 67 second exposure to capture the stars (f22, 8mm lens, ISO
1250, it's 67 seconds because of the "600 rule." If you
divide the focal length (8mm) into 600 you get 75. That's the amount
of time I have before the stars start to streak. (it's 67 because I
count in my head and that's never right on, it should have been 75
seconds)
2. another quick shot at 1/250th, f8, ISO 100 with an external flash to
light the buildings.
I then lay #2 over #1 in "SCREEN" blending mode and this is
the basic result....no masking involved.
I also use curves and levels to bring out all of the stars in the RAW
file data. You are shooting in RAW, right?
mplatt86, cschroeder12, Rehab Saleh || رحاب, Wynonna, and 253 other people added this photo to their favorites.
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[gege] 7 months ago | reply
Amazing result! But it's really touching to see pros sharing their techniques in such detail. Thanks again!
sahil_jain 5 months ago | reply
Brilliant brilliant brilliant !!!
sahil_jain 5 months ago | reply
I liked the explanation of 600 rule. I once tried sunny 16 rule but to my despair, the resulting photograph was poor. Maybe the photo had to be processed using a software or something.
Rainer Pfingst 4 months ago | reply
very well