Post #3, Digging in

So after that first attempt at taking pictures at night, I was determined to get better results.  My first resource was of course, a Google search for "night photography tips."  Being specifically interested in taking pictures of the Milky Way, I came across this article by National Geographic Photographer, Kansas-based Jim Richardson.  This article would later be a great resource for me, but I had to experiment on my own to really take in all its helpful information.

However, from this article and my previous experience, it became clear that my point-and-shoot camera, with its limited options for creative control, would not suffice.  The longest shutter speed (length the film or digital sensor is exposed to light) my camera offered was 15 seconds.  This wasn't enough time to capture details in the sky and the landscape.  The purchase of a digital Single Lens Reflex camera helped solve this problem; I could open the shutter for as long as I wanted.  I could also set the aperture (measurement of the lens opening) to a wider setting to let in more light.  I also could set the ISO (camera's sensitivity to light) much higher than my point-and-shoot camera.

As mentioned in the article, I found that ambient light (existing light) would also greatly affect pictures taken.  If I wanted a picture of the Milky Way, I would have to drive outside of town. I didn't realize how far from town I would need to be, though; this would be something I had to learn from experience.  I hope to go into more details on this later!

But for now, here are a few pictures to show you how light from cities affect how you see the night sky.

This picture was taken about 30 minutes west of Topeka, looking southeast:

And this was taken in western Kansas, also looking southeast:

Can you tell which one was taken near the city?

Post #2, In the Beginning

Every story has a beginning.  My adventure with nighttime photography began over two years ago. My interest in general photography dates longer, at least 10 years.  I took pictures with a point-and-shoot digital camera for many of those years, and this same point-and-shoot camera was the camera I first used when starting out taking pictures at night.  I now use a digital SLR (Single Lens Reflex) camera...more on how that has helped my photography later!

A friend had wanted to test his pinhole camera at night, and so I went along.  He told me, in convincing me to go along, that if I pointed my camera toward the sky for a timed exposure, I could capture different colors in the sky (from the stars, rotating).

In my mind, what I thought I was going to get was something like this:

However, what I ended up with was this:

As you can see (or cannot, since the pictures are dark), my pictures did not turn out as planned!  I was disappointed, but that set in motion my quest to improve these pictures. And so I set out to do some research: how can I take better pictures?  

Stay tuned for some tips I found to improve my photography!

Post 1: Welcome

Hello!

Welcome to my blog on night photography. Shooting pictures at night has been an interest of mine for some time, but it took some research on my part to get results like I wanted.  Here I hope to share with you some pictures and possibly later videos I have taken on my quest to capture the world at night.  I would also like to share some tips of my own to this facet of photography.  I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I like to take the pictures!