Orion as Star Trails

I seeee......

Thanks Michael, and it is a great shot Keith!

Seanie.

Seanie, you will get the slides developed first, these usually take a week or so , but after that they can be put to prints for the next day

Michael, thanks for the tip!! Glad you both liked the shot.
Keith..

Thanks Keith, didn't know that - I'm learning something new all the time!

Seanie.

Still, M42 comes out as an orange line, as does Betelgeuse, so I know that the glow has not affected the colour of the stars. Can anyone shed any light (geddit?!?!) on how to minimise this kind of wash, and get a darker image without the need to go digital on it, or is that just the way it goes?

Can CCD make such long trails??

Thanks,

Seanie.

Seanie,

With respect to the wash you describe, it is due to sky glow. What you can do is get a light pollution filter which should help eliminate a good portion of the tungstan line lighting. There are both narrow and wideband LPR's (light pollution reducing filters) and it may be your worthwhile to get both.

As for CCD's, the answer is yes due to two reasons: first, we can mate 35mm lenses onto a CCD camera (SBIG's for example) which give us a much wider view of the sky and hence allow for such trailing and, second, there is a trend towards larger and larger imaging chips which makes this possible even further. For example, SBIG's STL11000 series has CCD chips the size of 35mm film!

Anthony.

Hi,
If you got the recient issues of sky and telkescope, they talk about how to take "long exposure" images of star trails, AND get a jet black background with a digital camera.

That was an EXCELLENT article (Mar/2004 issue) and is something I will be trying very shortly with my EOS 300d.

As for how to do it with a 35mm film, all you can do is shorten the exposure and use fast film.,

This will NOT work since the skyglow on the faster film will build faster and in spite of the shorter exposure. In other words, halving the exposure and doubling the speed of the film will net you nothing.

I've seen that greenish glow with heat damaged or old film, ones that have been sitting in the cupboard for the last 2+ years or so.
I usually get tangerine/yellow background in my long exposure 35mm shots.

This yellowing and tangerine is certainly light pollution and skyglow due to the tungsten lighting. Best bets are the light-pollution reducing filters.

As for how to do it with a 35mm film, all you can do is shorten the exposure and use fast film.,

This will NOT work since the skyglow on the faster film will build faster and in spite of the shorter exposure. In other words, halving the exposure and doubling the speed of the film will net you nothing.

I see what your saying, but most constellation shots I've ever taken have produced better results with faster film (for a number of reason, but not necessarily light pollution reasons).

I've seen that greenish glow with heat damaged or old film, ones that have been sitting in the cupboard for the last 2+ years or so.
I usually get tangerine/yellow background in my long exposure 35mm shots.

This yellowing and tangerine is certainly light pollution and skyglow due to the tungsten lighting. Best bets are the light-pollution reducing filters.

Probabily true in this case, but I have shots from damaged film which produced wierd colour results.