Tags
Acadia National Park, Cadillac Mountain, Galactic Core, Light trails, Maine, Milky Way, National Park, Summit
For the last year, I have been learning how to photograph the night sky. Early last year, I was in Maine visiting my in-laws and I decided to venture out in the middle night to take some images of the starry night. I was in search of the Milky Way and little did I know it was not visible at that time of the year.
I visited Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks in June 2015. One of my goals was to take a few photos of the Milky Way. While I had no problem finding the constellation’s galactic core, I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Although Wyoming has some pretty dark skies, at 3:30am the Milky Way was on top of Jackson and my composition was not that great. The night was not a complete loss. I did take some nice photos of the Teton Range at night and I got some amazing shots of the sunrise.
I returned once again to Maine during the Perseid meteor shower in mid-August of 2015. By this time, I had a better idea of what I was doing. I downloaded an app that helped me track the movement of the Milky Way and I captured some pretty nice photos of its galactic core in Acadia National Park.
I am still learning how to post-process photos of the night sky. I recently acquired a Rokinon 14mm f 2.8 lens which will help me get sharper images of the stars and wider compositions that will capture the Milky Way in one frame. I am eagerly waiting for April when the Milky Way will be visible once again in my neck of the woods.
Today’s photo is an accident of sorts. I was on the summit of Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park to photograph the sunset and to take some photos of the Milky Way. When I got to the top of the mountain, there was virtually no wind. But once the sun set, the winds started to pick up, making long-exposure photography quite difficult. I did have a heavy tripod and few sand bags to provide more stability but those 25 miles per hour winds were slightly shaking the camera. Needless to say, I was pretty annoyed. I decided to regroup and head to another location where the wind would be less strong.
As I was driving down the mountain, I decided to pull over the side of the road to test my luck. While the wind was not as strong, my challenge was the many cars driving up down the road. These cars did ruin many shots, but this one came out OK. I think I will try to recreate this photo this summer, but I may try to use a graduated neutral density filter to balance the dark sky with the light trails made by the cars.
Camera: Canon 6D
Lens: EF 24-105mm f4 L
Focal Length: 24mm
Aperture: f 4
Shutter: 20 seconds
ISO: 6400
Post-processing: Edited in Lightroom and Perfect Effects 9.0.