Late Autumn Night Sky over New Jersey: Star Trails and Meteor Trails.
Repeat from last night, but at ISO 400. Nikon 1 V1 camera with the 10 mm f/2.8 lens, and the following settings: ISO 400, manual exposure, 30 second exposure, f/2.8, focus infinity (Long exposure NR = off). I used the interval timer, but found that I needed to set the interval to 40 seconds because it takes ~10 seconds to transfer the image from the buffer to the memory card. This is unfortunate, since it leaves a gap if I tried to create stacked star trails (using the Star Trails program). I did manage to catch a few images of meteor trails. The meteor trails were distinct from the many jet trails. The first two were a pair, but faint, the third is caught in two images with the missing section due to the ~10 second delay between images. The late night and early morning images were combined to make a Night Sky time-lapse video.
Meteor Trail captured with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 10 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 400, 10 mm, f/2.8, 30 sec). (David J Mathre)Meteor Trail captured with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 10 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 400, 10 mm, f/2.8, 30 sec). (David J Mathre)Meteor Trail captured with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 10 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 400, 10 mm, f/2.8, 30 sec). (David J Mathre)Meteor Trail captured with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 10 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 400, 10 mm, f/2.8, 30 sec). (David J Mathre)
Late Autumn Night Sky over New Jersey: Meteor Trails and Time-lapse Video.
I wanted to see how the new Nikon 1 V1 camera performs doing night sky photography. I set up the camera with the 10 mm f/2.8 lens, and the following settings: ISO 100, manual exposure, 30 second exposure, f/2.8, focus infinity (Long exposure NR = off). I used the interval timer, but found that I needed to set the interval to 40 seconds because it takes ~10 seconds to transfer the image from the buffer to the memory card. This is unfortunate, since it would leave a gap if I tried to create stacked star trails (using the Star Trails program). I did manage to catch an image of a meteor trail early (5:28 AM) in the morning. The late night and early morning images were combined to make a Night Sky time-lapse video.
Meteor Trail captured with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 10 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 100, 10 mm, f/2.8, 30 sec). (David J Mathre)
Backyard Autumn Nighttime Sky Over New Jersey: Time-lapse Video and Star Trails.
Wide-angle night sky time-lapse video looking south in New Jersey (~600 1 minute images taken with a Nikon D3x and 14-24 mm f/2.8 lens at 15 mm and f/5.6). The moon was from another night (video taken with a Nikon D3s and 600 mm f/4 telephoto lens). The overall video sequence created using Adobe Premiere Pro.
The images were also combined in groups of 100 using the Star Trails program to create the following south view star trails. The orange background is due to clouds being lit from the towns to the south. In the last two images the moon is visible.
After nearly two months of rain, rain, and cloudy skies — we finally have been able to see the sun and very blue skies. At night, I’ve taken the opportunity to get night sky images, as well as lunar images through some of my exotic 300, 400, 500, and 600 mm lenses. One of the problems I was having for the overnight time-lapsed images was that the lens would get covered by condensation during the night and ruin the night sky images. ARRG! As the weekend progressed, the temperature rose and the relative humidity decreased. I finally got a full night image set with limited problems with condensation. The first time-lapse video and star trail was recorded with a Nikon D3x camera and 14-24 mm f/2.8 lens @ 14 mm. There was a bit of condensation that affected the end of the video from this lens. The second time-lapse video and star trail image was recorded with a Nikon D3 camera and 16 mm f/2.8 fisheye lens looking north from my deck.
Lessons learned: 1) I need to look into a resistive heater to keep the lenses warm enough to prevent condensation. 2) I didn’t know that the 14-24 mm lens would creep if pointed straight up — during one night the focal length changed from 14 to 18 mm. For the last night, I used Gaffer tape to fix the focal length of the lens at 14 mm. 3) My tripod/heads are not strong enough to prevent movement when I change batteries. Look into an external power supply and not batteries for long overnight image session.
Star Trails – Southern Sky View (19:30-0545). Composite of images taken with a Nikon D3x camera and 14-28 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 100, 14 mm, f/2.8, 119 sec exposures). (David J Mathre)Star Trails – Northern Sky View (19:30-0545). Composite of images taken with a Nikon D3 camera and 16 mm f/2.8 fisheye lens (ISO 200, 16 mm, f/4, 119 sec exposures). (David J Mathre)
