which lens for star shots

iwols

iwols

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hi all with the clear nights hanging about just wondered which lens would be best for star capturing ,my 18-70mm nikon f4.5-f5.6,,,,70-300mm,,,,or 90mm f2.8,and any starting settings thanks guys
 
thanks can anyone recommend a good how to guide cheers
 
You want star trails like the above tutorial, or just shots of the stars. The two are very different. If you want stars with no movement, you're limited to around 20 seconds with a 24mm lens on a full frame camera if you want no movement recorded, so then you have to rely on very high ISO and wide apertures.

The wider the lens, the longer you'll get before movement is recorded.

For non trails shots, you pretty much need dark skies too... away from light pollution.

Star trails are easier to begin with.
 
just the stars 18-70mm nikon f4.5-f5.6 or 90mm f2.8 and any rough settings please thanks guys
 
If you want static starts your going want as shorter exposure as possible ideally, but balancing that you need to be open long enough to register as many stars as possible, as such i'd suggest shooting at you widest aperture on a 15 second exposure and the highest ISO that you are comfortable using on your camera then you may find you need to adjusts your settings to suit your scene to keep it simple I'd only adjust ISO to start and then maybe a combination of settings once your a little more confident in shooting stars :thumbs:

Nick_1981 said:
http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=355313

Have a look at the above from the tutorial section
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Thanks for that :thumbs:
 
thanks for that but which lens for starters please
MWHCVT said:
If you want static starts your going want as shorter exposure as possible ideally, but balancing that you need to be open long enough to register as many stars as possible, as such i'd suggest shooting at you widest aperture on a 15 second exposure and the highest ISO that you are comfortable using on your camera then you may find you need to adjusts your settings to suit your scene to keep it simple I'd only adjust ISO to start and then maybe a combination of settings once your a little more confident in shooting stars :thumbs:



Thanks for that :thumbs:
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It depends on what you want to capture, personally I would suggest the short end of your short lens as that's going to give you the longest exposure time without getting trails :thumbs:
 
i got some okay shots on my 70-200 and 2xtc in the canary islands recently ;)
even shots of the 7 sisters
beautiful skies out there
 
MWHCVT said:
It depends on what you want to capture, personally I would suggest the short end of your short lens as that's going to give you the longest exposure time without getting trails :thumbs:
Click to expand...

Cheers
 
Might be a stupid question, but for pics with foreground - what's the best way to ensure focus given that it's pitch black and AF won't cut it?
 
The Great Poobar said:
Might be a stupid question, but for pics with foreground - what's the best way to ensure focus given that it's pitch black and AF won't cut it?
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There are a number of ways you can do it, AF is one of them still even in the dark :thumbs:

You can manually focus with the step back method (start at infinity and work back with test exposures till you get a focus your happy with)

If you have a lens with a focus gauge on it you can use this to give you a rough idea of focus and then tweak after testing :thumbs:

Or and this is normally the easiest, using a powerful torch illuminate the area that you want in focus and then use AF to achieve focus, then switch to MF once focus is confirmed, always do a test exposure to make sure that you've nailed focus and there is nothing worse than spending hours taking photo's only to find them OOF when you've finished ;)
 
iwols said:
Any pics of these matt
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Here's a couple of images for you iwols, these were taken with my Skywatcher
150p-ds scope mounted on a eq5 synscan pro goto mount and a canon 600d. you are limited with the length of exposure up to about 20 secs before you start getting star trails, unless you use a motorised mount, but you should still be able get some great images with just your camera and tripod. anyway here a a couple we took wednesday night.

Pleaides (severn sisters)
8452431561_a8a91bc3c4.jpg


Orion Nebula
8453521092_4cfff7a587.jpg


Thanks Andy
 
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thanks for those andy wish ide kept my skywatcher 125 a little longer and persevered with it ,was there much editing on those especially the second one
Andy77 said:
Here's a couple of images for you iwols, these were taken with my Skywatcher
150p-ds scope mounted on a eq5 synscan pro goto mount and a canon 600d. you are limited with the length of exposure up to about 20 secs before you start getting star trails, unless you use a motorised mount, but you should still be able get some great images with just your camera and tripod. anyway here a a couple we took wednesday night.

Pleaides (severn sisters)
8452431561_a8a91bc3c4.jpg


Orion Nebula
8453521092_4cfff7a587.jpg


Thanks Andy
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Would a 50mm. Nikon 1.8 d. af lens be any better than the 3 lens I have for star shooting and general photography cheers
 
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Yes.. it would, but even better would be a 28mm wide angle, manual focus is best, I used to use an old sigma 28mm manual focus lens when I did it.. worked a treat.
 
iwols said:
Would a 50mm. Nikon 1.8 d. af lens be any better than the 3 lens I have for star shooting and general photography cheers
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It would be good if 50mm is the sort of length you want to work with. Personally I would prefer something wider than that which would maybe more easily allow you get something substantial as foreground interests whilst retaining a huge expanse of sky in your shot. In performance terms though, it should work well. If you do go down this route, I'd try stopping it down a bit to get better sharpness across the frame, 2.8 should work well on a crop body and will still let in plenty of light.

I'd still be temped to play with your current lens first before splurging any money. I know it's the boring route as it doesn't involve a shiny new toy but if nothing else it should tell you what focal lengths work best for you.
 
gad-westy said:
It would be good if 50mm is the sort of length you want to work with. Personally I would prefer something wider than that which would maybe more easily allow you get something substantial as foreground interests whilst retaining a huge expanse of sky in your shot. In performance terms though, it should work well. If you do go down this route, I'd try stopping it down a bit to get better sharpness across the frame, 2.8 should work well on a crop body and will still let in plenty of light.

I'd still be temped to play with your current lens first before splurging any money. I know it's the boring route as it doesn't involve a shiny new toy but if nothing else it should tell you what focal lengths work best for you.
Click to expand...
 
:)cheers youve probably hit the nail on the head with the last sentence involving a new toy
 
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