Astro season is ON

Right now I'm pretty excited because I took propably the best astro photo so far. New moon, not too many clouds, nearly astronomical darkness, shooting stars, could it really be any better. In my opinion: NO, except some auroras would be welcome, but anyhow last night was stunning. The fresh autumn scent floating in the air in the middle of dark forest. I can't imagine anything cooler than this. I took 100 frames for my timelapse video also which is nice as well. Unfortunately this week's weather forecast doesn't look too good for me. It's going to rain whole week.

EXIF:
Canon 6D
Samyang 14mm
30 sec
f/2.8
iso2500

New gear!

As I've already mentioned on my Facebook page I sold my whole Nikon gear, and for a while I've been collecting new even better camera gear! This time I bought Canon 6D (sorry all Nikonists), which I think is absolutely one of the best investments for a long time. Of course ended up I buying new lenses as well. For astro photos and landscapes I bought Samyang 14mm f/2.8 which is most likely the best lens for my purposes, at least by its quality-price ratio (245 euros). For portraits I bought Canon 85mm f/1.8 which was also reasonably cheap considering the quality of the images (290 euros). And last but not least, the 6D itself cost 1600 euros, YIIKES :S

I'm pretty broke despite of selling my old gear, but enough of the money talk. Now I have decent gear serving my needs better than my previous setup. I still love some of Nikon's features, but I've found some even better features from my new love. For example the thumb scroll, first I found it super clumsy, but the more I use it, the more I like it. Now I can take astro photos with ISO-12800 easily, and probably with even higher ISO-value, INCREDIBLE!

Here's a precisely the seventh photo I took with the 6D

EXIF:
Exposure time: 30sec
Aperture: f/2.8
ISO: 6400
Focal lenght: 14mm

Tenerife!

Hola people! Last week I was on a vacation at Tenerife, and I took pretty awesome photos! I'll post some of them as I manage to process them ( plenty of panoramas incoming! ).

... And yes I was photographing sunset above clouds!

The Moon Halo

Usually I hate the moon, but today is an exception. The moon made a dim halo to the sky which I found rather cool! My facebook page also hit 200 likes today, so this post is to celebrate those thumbs you've given me, THANK YOU SO MUCH! In case you don't already like my page please do it HERE

Astro remake

Hello people! Like usually "it's been quiet for a while". I'm not going to lie to you, honestly I've been lazy, and that's all. Last weekend was quite amazing, I had three workshops about astro photography at Kuva&Kamera -fair, and I met one of my biggest idols MIKKO LAGERSTEDT! I also learned a couple of new techniques how to process astro photos, which is super exciting and that's the reason for today's post. I reprocessed one of my personal favourite astro photos, and the difference between these two images is huge. The result with this advanced techinique is incredible, I'm pretty stoked!

Click to enlarge

Forgotten astro

Lately I've been photographing A LOT, and I totally had forgotten one quite nice astro photo. This one was taken in September. You can see more of the sweet middle part of Milky Way in this photo compared to the previous one I posted, and day by day Milky Way is disappearing beyond the horizon.

camera - Nikon D300S
lens - Tokina 11 - 16mm
exposure time - 30 sec
aperture - f/2.8
iso - 3200
focal lenght - 12mm

Astral greatness

I guess that earlier this week I got the best milky way photo so far. The feeling when you're standing in the middle of forest, total darkness surrounds you and the only thing you hear is the wind gently blowing. Staring the sky upon you, you see thousands and thousands of stars and it makes you feel a very small piece in this huge universe. Your everyday misfortures start to feel meaningless.

I want to thank Andrei for my new stamp. In my opinion it looks really cool especially if you compare it to my previous one. 

Astro lakescape

This is a follow-up for the previous photo, not self-portrait though this time. I was actually trying how far can I go with my iso. This one was taken with iso-1600 and it's still suitable even though my body isn't the most expensive high-end camera.

EXIF:
exposure time - 59 sec
aperture - f/2.8
iso - 1600
focal lenght - 11mm
body - nikon d300s

Perseid self-portrait

Here's a slightly unusual self-portrait taken during the perseid meteor shower last week. The location is my usual astro-spot. I noticed it is still too bright even though there's no Moon on the sky. This photo was taken around 2.30am and you can already see the dawn - conclusion: I still have to wait for darker nights.

EXIF:
exposure time - 105 sec
aperture - f/2.8
iso - 100
focal lenght - 11mm
body - nikon d300s

Open letter

Dear clouds. Please be kind and leave my perfect photography spot immediately.

Sincerely yours Esa

Milky waaaaayyyyy!

Here is an another photo from previous star hunting. This one is processed with more time and effort given. And as I personally like more of vertical astrophotos this one looks lots of better than the previous one to me even though this one is without shooting star. 

Day after this photo we went to photograph nearby, and I managed to capture something beautiful as well, but I will post them later. Next photos will be something different than astrophotos I PROMISE :D My nemesis (clouds) have returned to the sky, and next clear night won't come soon if you believe the forecast.

EXIF:
exposure time -  30 sec
aperture - f/3.5
iso - 640
focal length - 8mm 

Milky way, nothern lights and shooting stars

As I said yesterday, fuck the portraits, it’s time for another astrophoto! It was freezing cold outside, but what wouldn’t an astrophoto addict do for a proper shoot. There are better photos as well but I decided to post this one as it has the shooting star in as well.

In this photo, I managed to capture many exciting things. My main goal was to take a picture of the Milky Way but just because I am so pro, I managed to capture the northern lights as well. And if you watch carefully enough, you might also the shooting star I mentioned. At first I corrected the barrel distortion caused by the lens but after all decided to let it be. What do you guys think, should’ve I corrected it after all or not? While I was taking these photos, I actually managed to lose one of my lenses. The 30mm lens was lost for an hour but I luckily found it. It lying between the rocks just 10cm away from the freezing cold water.

EXIF:
exposure time -  30 sec
aperture - f/3.5
iso - 1000
focal length - 8mm

... Astro pt.5

Here we go again. Another astrophoto, but this will be the last one for a while before these annoying clouds decide to leave my sky. I got plenty of material from portrait photography course, so I will post some portraits next (if the sky won't clear up soon). I guess I should buy wider lens for this astro thing, because I have problems fitting enough stuff in the sky. I've been looking for tokina 11 - 16mm, samyang 14mm and nikon 14 - 24mm, but at the moment I'm too poor to invest to that nikon lens at least. Which lenses do you use for astro photography?


EXIF:
exposure time -  20 sec
aperture - f/5
iso - 640
focal length - 30mm

Astro pt.4

I'm really hooked up with astro photography. This photo is taken from the same spot with photo in previous post. Except this one is vertical. In my opinion it makes huge difference after all. The reason for posting a photo similar to the previous one is to show you the the difference between horizontal and vertical landscapes. Compare this one to the previous photo and let me know which one you like more. Personally I like more the vertical one in this scene, because I can fit more stuff into photo, like the rocks in the bottom and I have more space for the stars. Horizontal view is pretty much all the same, woods and a few cottage, so there is no reason extend it.

EXIF:
exposure time -  30 sec
aperture - f/5.6
iso - 400
focal length - 30mm

Astro fever pt.3

Once again I was freezing out in the forest chasing stars, but my arch enemies (moon and clouds) were polluting my precious sky. I didn't capture too many stars, but I got couple of decent landscapes. It was definetely worth catching a cold last night.

EXIF:
exposure time -  30 sec
aperture - f/5.6
iso - 400
focal length - 30mm

Astro photo pt.2

Here is an another photo from my astro photography adventures. This one is taken with fisheye, that explains the massive barrel distortion. 

EXIF: 
exposure time - 30 sec
aperture - f/3.5
iso - 400
focal length - 8mm

Astrolakelandwhateverscape

The new and interesting thing (at least in my opinion) I told you about was astro photography. My torment is now over, I saw clear night sky (partially) first time in two weeks and of course I photographied it. I'm still strugling with the focusing and exposure. Here is one photo from this week, I will post more of these later as I learn to photograph the night sky. 

EXIF: 
exposure time - 30 sec
aperture - f/5.6
iso - 800
focal length - 30mm