Orion

Photographed from
near Granton Harbour

Christmas Day, 2014

Photo
1.

Orion

Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour

© Peter Stubbs   peter.stubbs@edinphoto.org.uk                Photographed December 25, 2014

Photo
2.

Orion

Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour

© Peter Stubbs   peter.stubbs@edinphoto.org.uk                Photographed December 25, 2014

 

Comment

1.

Orion

The Photos

The two photos above were taken at 11.15pm on Christmas Day 2014, three days after the new moon.  It was a cold, clear night with no moon in the sky.

Both photos were 1-second time exposures, taken with a Canon EOS 6D camera with Canon 28-135 mm lens, set to 56mm. 

-  Photo 1 was at taken at 25,600 ISO:  Photo 2 at 12,800 ISO.  Both results looked similar, but I made Photoshop adjustments to levels, brightness and contrast in Photo 1 to bring out more stars.

-  I was surprised just how many stars appeared.  I counted about 350 on Photo 1 when displayed at the largest size - 2048 pixels high. That's  far more than could be seen with the naked eye.  The camera appears to have captured stars as faint as magnitude 6, possibly fainter***.  Perhaps somebody will be able to check that and email me to let me know what they have found.  ***Please also see 'Update' below

Prints

I've found that the image above and others that show bright stars against a dark background (such as these pictures of the whole sky taken with a fisheye lens) don't print well.   Most of the stars cannot be seen on the print.

The Night Sky, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour ©    ©

However by converting the picture  to become a negative (e.g. using image>adjust>invert in Photoshop) an image with black stars against a white background is created, and this does print well.

Peter Stubbs, Edinburgh:  January 5, 2014, updated January 6, 2014

Update

I've now compared this photo with a star map and found that stars all brightness down to and including magnitude 7 appear to have been recorded on this photo.

Peter Stubbs, Edinburgh:  January 5, 2014, updated January 6, 2014

 

View 2 medium size photos

1024 pixels high

Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour ©    Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour ©

View 2 large size photos

2048 pixels high

Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour ©    Orion, Christmas Day 2014  -  Photo taken from near Granton Harbour ©

 

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