Family Holiday in Cornwall

10 days in Cornwall in July/August for a family holiday. Weather was great, with a couple of nice sunsets. It's hard to not get the camera out when you see the sun dipping down over the rockpools and beaches of North Cornwall.
Happy with this collection, though no stunners in there.

Liam watching the sunset over Little Fistral

Watching the storm roll in. Pentire Head

Pentire sunset

Little Fistral flow 

Evening surf

Last Milky Way of the spring?

Keen to get a Milky Way shot in before the light nights and last night was super-clear, with half a moon to the North-West. Could be ideal, so I headed for Seaford.
Plan was to shoot the MW over the Coastguard Cottages, then get some beach shots before returning to the cottages for the sunrise.
There were other people in the car park, so I headed off to Cuckmere River, then Birling Gap, then Belle Tout Lighthouse where there were no people (except one photographer at the lighthouse, who I figure heard/saw me, as he kept sweeping his torch in my direction.
Managed to escape unseen, with no awkward 3am encounters!
Happy with the results, all done using stacking with Sequator.

Got an hour of sleep in the car, then headed back to the Coastguard Cottages to catch the sunrise. Very pleasant! Then a couple of hours drive and back home for work/school dropoff at 0730. Quite a night.

Birling Gap Milky Way
8x stacked 25sec @ f4.0 ISO3200

Birling Gap Milky Way
8x stacked 25sec @ f4.0 ISO3200

Cuckmere River Milky Way
8x stacked 25sec @ f4.0 ISO3200

4 shot pano

3 shot exposure bracketed

Belle Tout lighthouse
8 x 25sec @ f4.0 ISO3200, Stacked in Sequator

Bluebells in Wiltshire

A VERY early start with the family (4am) to catch sunrise (and hopefully some mist) down in West Woods, Wiltshire.
Not a locations I've been to before, so it's always risky arriving in the dark. However, thanks to some pre-trip research, we found the bluebells easily (they are hard to miss).
Didn't quite get the mist I was after, but the flowers here are stunning and the rising sun gave a lovely ethereal effect to some of the images. The sky clouded over about an hour after sunrise, so I was very pleased to have got the best of the day.
Headed off to Avebury and Adams grave after, but no pics from that as it was grey...

A rare albino English bluebell

Bluebells in the Surrey Hills

Headed to White Down to a well-known Bluebell site in search of the elusive misty/sun rays bluebell shot.
First visit was mid-morning, with nice dappled sunlight through the canopy.
Second day was a dawn raid, in hope of some mist and sun. Plenty of mist around in the valleys, but alas, none in the woods, and no sun due to the low cloud/mist.
Still quite pleased with the results although not got the hero shot I've after just yet.

Day 1. Dappled sunlight through the trees.

Processed with a little Orton Effect

Day 2. Processed with a little Orton Effect

Day 2. Something a bit different, zooming in from 18mm to 50mm on a 2sec exposure

Misty sunrise over Surrey

A nice bright misty forecast for dawn, so I set off to Virginia Water to find bluebells near the South car park.
Didn't find any, but got some lovely shots of the misty sunrise and Chobham Common shrouded in mist on the way there.

Chobham Common

Chobham Common

Chobham Common and the M3

Virginia Water sunrise

Virginia Water sunrise
(processed with just a touch of Orton effect)

Virginia Water sunrise
(processed with just a touch of Orton effect)

Spring Evening... Sunsets and star trails

After a fairly cloudy, damp afternoon, it looked like a nice sunset might be on the cards, so I headed out to Guildford to a field of oil seed rape I'd scoped out with the kids a couple of days earlier.
The sunset didn't disappoint, and with my son for company, we both got some great shots of the sunset over the glorious yellow field...

Surrey sunset over a field of oil seed rape

Later that evening (around midnight), with a clear sky, I headed up to the top of Curley Hill to get a star trail shot. Really pleased with the outcome- based on 30mins of shooting before a torch started coming towards me along the ridge.
Stacked in StarStax, with a fair bit or Lightroom work to reduce the light pollution from Bagshot and the M3.

90 x 20sec shots @ ISO3200 (total of 30mins exposure). Light painting done on the plinth for just a second or so, using my head torch

Hunting Bluebells

It's bluebell season and we headed to Guildford, to the Chantries, a well-known spot for bluebells.
An early start with the family, I got a couple of early morning sunrise/pre-sunrise shots around Guildford and from Pewley down before getting the bluebell shots once the sun had risen a little.

Pleased with the results, but I think the bluebells could do with being a bit more dense, or maybe I just need to get a lower vantage. Might give it another go later in the week.

Pewley Down Sunrise

Chantry Wood Sunrise

Pewley Down Sunrise with the family

Bluebells in Chantry Wood

Bluebells in Chantry Wood

Guildford Cathedral from Chantry Wood

Moon setting over the River Wey- Pre-sunrise

Sunrise over Surrey, from Pewley Down

Sunrises and sunsets in Fuerteventura

Combining family days out with late night/early morning astro shoots, I managed to get a nice collection of sunrise/sunset shots from a week in Fuereventura....

Dawn Milky Way over the East coast

Sunset lighting up clouds over the East coast

Sunset over El Cotillo beach on the West Coast

Sunrise on the East coast after an overnight astro shoot. Love the "coffee bean" rocks on the beach.
20sec exposure, no filter needed as it was quite dark.

Sunrise over Caleta de Fuste beach (East coast) on the way home from an astro shoot.
Right out the back of our apartment.

A night of astrophotography in Fuerteventura

A week's family holiday in Fuerteventura and I have been planning the weather/hire car combo for weeks!
As it turned out, I had to wait until the last night to get clear skies and access to a car so I could find some dark skies.
With just a little light pollution from a nearby village (Pozo Negro), the sky was very dark, with the entire Milky Way arch visible to the naked eye.
I took a tracked (4min @ ISO400) shot using my new MoveShootMove tracker, which turned out great.

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 4mins @ ISO400 on MooveShootMove tracker

  
  
I then tried to get 4 more shots to get the full MW arch as a panorama, which seemed to work well, but once I got back home to edit, I noticed that the tracking is out after the first 2 shots, so the majority of the image has streaking stars. Oh well... Will be more careful next time!
Interesting to see the light pollution, even in a very dark area. The central glow is from a handful of streetlights in the nearby (2 miles) village and the glow on the left is from the large town of Calete de Fuste, about 10 miles away. There's no escaping those damn streetlights!

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 5x 4mins @ ISO400 on MooveShootMove tracker, then stitched into a panorama using Microsoft ICE (PTGUI couldn't manage it!)

I also tried a 9xshot 20s @ ISO3200 and stacked using Sequator. Quite pleased with the results and it's good to compare quality with the tracked shot...Also got a similar one of the hire car under the MW.

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 9 x 20sec @ ISO3200, stacked on Sequator

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 9 x 20sec @ ISO3200, stacked on Sequator

As dawn was breaking, I headed to the coast and got this last shot of the Milky Way hanging on as dawn breaks..

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 4 x 20sec @ ISO3200, stacked on Sequator

All in all, a great night and I'm pleased with how much I've squeezed from my mid-range kit, just by using all the tools available (tracking, stacking....etc).

Dark skies in Fuerteventura

On the way home from a trip to the North of the island, we stopped off at the Windmill (next to the observatory) to try to capture some of the clear, dark skies in the centre of the island.
There was a bit of cloud floating about, but I'm please with this shot, with the moon and Orion centre stage.

Canon 77D, Sigma 10-20mm F4.0, 4 x 20s @ ISO3200, stacked in Sequator

Missed opportunity?

Had every intention of going down to Dorset last night for what was forecast a super-clear night, with MW and no moon.
Work/family balance got the better of me and I switched off the alarm at 2am and went back to sleep. I can always go later in the week, eh?
Unfortunately, the rest of the week is now cloudy. Oh well. At least I'm well-rested.

New Star Tracker

Got my new MoveShootMove star tracker from China this week.
Just need a clear night to test it now!
Currently the moon is up with the Milky Way, so no chance of MW shots, but I'm on the lookout for a clear night so I can do some testing of the alignment laser and the unit itself.

First Milky Way shoot of 2019

I didn't do much Milky Way shooting last year, mainly as the hours are so inconvenient and the weather didn't co-operate.
March 2-15 is the first window of opportunity to see the MW this year, but the weather closed in for the week.
A forecast break in the clouds for this Monday night and I knew I had to give it a go.
I decided on a 1h15m drive down to Hengistbury Head- a location I'd been to a couple of weeks previously.
A 2am alarm call got me there for 0330 and setup on the dunes looking out to sea.
There was quite a bit of cloud, but it seemed to slowly be clearing. Sure enough, soon after 4am, the Milky Way was there in all most of it's glory.
At this time of year, it is still very low on the horizon and a bank of cloud obscured some of the core.
I'm happy with the image though, although it's still a bit grainy/muddy for my liking. I would like to be able to get a crisper image, but for that I think I need a kit upgrade.
The occasional flash of lightning out to see kept me on my toes, and I've caught one in the image. Also saw a bonus shooting star.
Decided not to stay for the sunrise (although it looked like it was going to be a good one) and was home for 7am.
All in all an enjoyable night, and I'm looking forward to clearer nights so I can get some more practice in. Still early in the season....

4 mins @ f4.0, ISO800 for the sky, using my home-made tracker
Same settings for the foreground shot, but without the tracker 

Room for improvement:
The 4min exposure has some star-trailing showing. I think I need to sort out the tracking rate. Maybe slightly less than 1 revolution per 2 minutes? Or maybe better alignment with the Pole star?
Would also be nice to try a Sony camera and/or a decent Sigma f1.4 lens to improve the quality of the image.