Hudson, As a participant in this workshop it’s was overwhelming great to have Rick and you as leaders and to enjoy the experience with so many other wonderful individuals. Thanks for the image in your video, can’t wait for the next workshop.
It's a steep rooty trail down to the overlook. Maybe 1/3 mile, but steep. Then there is a rock scrabble to get the last 25 feet down to the beach. The view from above without the scrabble is well worth it.
Hudson, a great video and content. Can you provide more info on what’s on your tripod including heads? Is that levelling base, tracker and then another ball head?
Great video as always Hudson. Thank you. I took the Move-Shoot-Move (MSM) out for the first time last night. I wasn't concerned about the rotation of the foreground. My goal was to practice. 😃 (Like you and Rick told us to do a few weeks ago.) I wanted to see how hard (or easy) it actually was to align with Polaris. I wanted to see if I could get pin-point stars, and I wanted to see if I crunched the numbers right to get a reasonable exposure. I live pretty close to Toronto, so a Milky Way shot was out of the question because of the light pollution, but the Big Dipper was obvious. I set the MSM up on the tripod before I left home, so that simplified what I had to do in the dark. I was surprised at how quick & easy it was to align the MSM with Polaris. Like you said, just a few seconds. What I did find though is that even with a Sony A7R3 and the Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 Loxia lens, the ballhead I was using was not strong enough to really lock things down tight, so I will be looking for a new ballhead. (I was using the cheap $23 one that MSM offers as an add on to their tracker.) Thanks for the great advice on the set-up and use of the MSM star tracker.
Some will complain about the mostly Nikon stuff, but it not so much about the camera or gear (I a Sony user 2014) BUT the Capture and the new view of another place and dreaming of a future in these places. Your capture of the Milky Way at a low ISO but longer exposure using the MSM is impressive along with the blend. For you vertical Panos with the landscape view would be impressive. But also in December and January look westward for the portrait 180 degree pano of our arm of the Milky Way, yes no Pegasus/Galactic Center but a rainbow of stars that are impressive over a westward foreground that most do not think or know about. You have those nice snow capped mountain tops/lakes that Glisten in the starlight. And also a note in the early months of Feb (every other year it is the first of the month for a new moon) to May if you go out say 5 days or more early you will get a crescent moon rising below the Milky Way like from Aug to Nov two or three days after a full moon till just before another full moon you can start early and stay out till that midnight hour when things go vertical. On the East coast once the moon rises the tide goes out if looking over the dark ocean, just all for planning. Sometimes you can beat a rainy new moon by a few early clear nights.
If only Nikon gave us more programmable buttons and the ability to assign one to pick AF mode. I use your AF tracking control setup. It's okay for some situations, but switching out to single AF point mode is needlessly slow going through the i-Menu. Nikon should buy a Lumix body and learn a few things about flexible personalization of controls.
More buttons would be nice, but you can assign it should you desire. I keep it on one of my front function buttons and on the 2nd custom button for long lenses with two. Hold the custom button and the front wheel controls area mode while the back wheel changes AF mode. :)
For focusing on stars, do you find the low light focus is dead on or do you use manual focus. With my D500 I have always turned off autofocus and manually focused via live view. I've heard with the Z6 & Z7 that everytime the camera is turned on, it will automatically refocus the lens to infiniti. I'm not sure I like that for astrophotography once I get focused the way I want.
Z6 II and Z7 II have options to keep that focus setting so that it will not refocus when turning on and off the camera. I experienced, though that the Z6(II) is easier to work with at low light than Z7(II) with regards to focusing. The view finder is noisy with Z7(II) and hard to see the stars.
With the latest updates you can have the Z cameras maintain their focus when turned off and back on. As Hudson mentioned the mirrorless low light autofocus is more accurate than manual - that's certainly been my experience and much easier as well. After autofocusing I was switching to manual incase I hit the autofocus button in the dark. Way cool.
Yep. Charlie is right, that feature was added via firmware to the 6 and 7,but I don't trust it to stay dead on. The Z's have no problem autofocusing handheld on planets with fast lenses in AF-S pinpoint with low light AF activated in the custom settings. :) take it off the rig, point it handheld and wait for the green square. Simple
Sorry Mr Hudson, its just about every other review say that Nikon's duo focus is not as good as Sony and Canon? But I must say I have been following (youtube) you for over a year and have listened to how you set your Z cameras. Yes I have alter one or two thing to suite my style I am just amazed at how good the focusing system is and the one or two that are out of focus is more down to me. I am loving the why my Z7ii focusing work. Keep well, keep safe and enjoy life.
I bet there are 150 Billion photos of the Milky Way that look a lot alike. I just praised an amateur photographer whose 1st night sky photo was of the Big Dipper. That was refreshing to see! She shot it on a phone while on a camping trip. I edited it for her and it came out really well for a hand-held phone photo.
I'd argue that only a small handful of those really look good viewed at 100 percent or up close printed huge. That's a bigger challenge than good constellation photography. I enjoy both, getting the Milky Way right in truly dark skies is a challenge I've enjoyed the past few years and cracking it feels great. Easy to look good on IG or FB, but so much harder to succeed big on paper or metal.
@@HudsonHenryPhoto I agree with you on that. This photo will only be used on Facebook, etc., so it's OK for that. And, for a first attempt with a phone it's OK. Noise reduction & sharpening in Photoshop helped, but it's still a phone photo. At least she was thinking for herself and shot the Big Dipper instead of the Milky Way.
You misunderstand me. I'm not denigrating the phone pic. I'm saying there are very few really good quality milky way photos. Sure there are a ton that look fine on IG, but zoom in to even 25% and it's all noise, trails and/or out of focus. Constellations are fun and much easier, because you shoot them at the end of blue hour at much brighter exposures. Milky way is a tremendous challenge to get right. It's true dark sky work. Not many do it in a way that's made to print. Again nothing wrong with constelations. My upcoming night sky course features a stacked blue hour capture on the big dipper alongside the tracker milky way captures. I just personally love the challenge and drama of the galaxy work.
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Hudson, As a participant in this workshop it’s was overwhelming great to have Rick and you as leaders and to enjoy the experience with so many other wonderful individuals. Thanks for the image in your video, can’t wait for the next workshop.
I can't wait to get back out there with you either Carl. It was a blast!
How far of a walk is that from the trail head down to Secret Beach? Doesn't look accessible by car? I guess that is why they call it Secret!?
It's a steep rooty trail down to the overlook. Maybe 1/3 mile, but steep. Then there is a rock scrabble to get the last 25 feet down to the beach. The view from above without the scrabble is well worth it.
Awesome Video Hudson. Thank you...really looking forward to your Milky Way Course!
Fantastic video, great advice and rekindled an old flame for Astro. Thanks Hudson....
Great tips, great trip. Thanks for sharing
Hudson, a great video and content. Can you provide more info on what’s on your tripod including heads? Is that levelling base, tracker and then another ball head?
Great video as always Hudson. Thank you.
I took the Move-Shoot-Move (MSM) out for the first time last night. I wasn't concerned about the rotation of the foreground. My goal was to practice. 😃 (Like you and Rick told us to do a few weeks ago.) I wanted to see how hard (or easy) it actually was to align with Polaris. I wanted to see if I could get pin-point stars, and I wanted to see if I crunched the numbers right to get a reasonable exposure. I live pretty close to Toronto, so a Milky Way shot was out of the question because of the light pollution, but the Big Dipper was obvious.
I set the MSM up on the tripod before I left home, so that simplified what I had to do in the dark. I was surprised at how quick & easy it was to align the MSM with Polaris. Like you said, just a few seconds. What I did find though is that even with a Sony A7R3 and the Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 Loxia lens, the ballhead I was using was not strong enough to really lock things down tight, so I will be looking for a new ballhead. (I was using the cheap $23 one that MSM offers as an add on to their tracker.)
Thanks for the great advice on the set-up and use of the MSM star tracker.
Nice, Hudson!
Some will complain about the mostly Nikon stuff, but it not so much about the camera or gear (I a Sony user 2014) BUT the Capture and the new view of another place and dreaming of a future in these places. Your capture of the Milky Way at a low ISO but longer exposure using the MSM is impressive along with the blend. For you vertical Panos with the landscape view would be impressive. But also in December and January look westward for the portrait 180 degree pano of our arm of the Milky Way, yes no Pegasus/Galactic Center but a rainbow of stars that are impressive over a westward foreground that most do not think or know about. You have those nice snow capped mountain tops/lakes that Glisten in the starlight. And also a note in the early months of Feb (every other year it is the first of the month for a new moon) to May if you go out say 5 days or more early you will get a crescent moon rising below the Milky Way like from Aug to Nov two or three days after a full moon till just before another full moon you can start early and stay out till that midnight hour when things go vertical. On the East coast once the moon rises the tide goes out if looking over the dark ocean, just all for planning. Sometimes you can beat a rainy new moon by a few early clear nights.
How early or late into the night did you have to wait for the milkyway down in brookings?
9:30pm this time of year
If only Nikon gave us more programmable buttons and the ability to assign one to pick AF mode. I use your AF tracking control setup. It's okay for some situations, but switching out to single AF point mode is needlessly slow going through the i-Menu. Nikon should buy a Lumix body and learn a few things about flexible personalization of controls.
More buttons would be nice, but you can assign it should you desire. I keep it on one of my front function buttons and on the 2nd custom button for long lenses with two. Hold the custom button and the front wheel controls area mode while the back wheel changes AF mode. :)
For focusing on stars, do you find the low light focus is dead on or do you use manual focus. With my D500 I have always turned off autofocus and manually focused via live view. I've heard with the Z6 & Z7 that everytime the camera is turned on, it will automatically refocus the lens to infiniti. I'm not sure I like that for astrophotography once I get focused the way I want.
Z6 II and Z7 II have options to keep that focus setting so that it will not refocus when turning on and off the camera. I experienced, though that the Z6(II) is easier to work with at low light than Z7(II) with regards to focusing. The view finder is noisy with Z7(II) and hard to see the stars.
With the latest updates you can have the Z cameras maintain their focus when turned off and back on. As Hudson mentioned the mirrorless low light autofocus is more accurate than manual - that's certainly been my experience and much easier as well. After autofocusing I was switching to manual incase I hit the autofocus button in the dark. Way cool.
Yep. Charlie is right, that feature was added via firmware to the 6 and 7,but I don't trust it to stay dead on. The Z's have no problem autofocusing handheld on planets with fast lenses in AF-S pinpoint with low light AF activated in the custom settings. :) take it off the rig, point it handheld and wait for the green square. Simple
Sorry Mr Hudson, its just about every other review say that Nikon's duo focus is not as good as Sony and Canon? But I must say I have been following (youtube) you for over a year and have listened to how you set your Z cameras. Yes I have alter one or two thing to suite my style I am just amazed at how good the focusing system is and the one or two that are out of focus is more down to me. I am loving the why my Z7ii focusing work. Keep well, keep safe and enjoy life.
I bet there are 150 Billion photos of the Milky Way that look a lot alike. I just praised an amateur photographer whose 1st night sky photo was of the Big Dipper. That was refreshing to see! She shot it on a phone while on a camping trip. I edited it for her and it came out really well for a hand-held phone photo.
I'd argue that only a small handful of those really look good viewed at 100 percent or up close printed huge. That's a bigger challenge than good constellation photography. I enjoy both, getting the Milky Way right in truly dark skies is a challenge I've enjoyed the past few years and cracking it feels great. Easy to look good on IG or FB, but so much harder to succeed big on paper or metal.
@@HudsonHenryPhoto I agree with you on that. This photo will only be used on Facebook, etc., so it's OK for that. And, for a first attempt with a phone it's OK. Noise reduction & sharpening in Photoshop helped, but it's still a phone photo. At least she was thinking for herself and shot the Big Dipper instead of the Milky Way.
You misunderstand me. I'm not denigrating the phone pic. I'm saying there are very few really good quality milky way photos. Sure there are a ton that look fine on IG, but zoom in to even 25% and it's all noise, trails and/or out of focus.
Constellations are fun and much easier, because you shoot them at the end of blue hour at much brighter exposures. Milky way is a tremendous challenge to get right. It's true dark sky work. Not many do it in a way that's made to print.
Again nothing wrong with constelations. My upcoming night sky course features a stacked blue hour capture on the big dipper alongside the tracker milky way captures. I just personally love the challenge and drama of the galaxy work.
@@HudsonHenryPhoto I agree with that also. No argument. Night sky photos are harer than people think to get good ones.