Scott Martin recently contacted us to tell us that he uses LR/Enfuse for blending star trail exposures.
To get full star trail images the exposure needs to be extremely long, however each individual shot is usually limited to a shorter time (5 – 30 minutes or so) so as not to overexpose the moonlit foreground. The solution is to take many shorter exposures and blend them together at the end.
Here are two examples provided by Scott. You can read more about the making of these images in Lance Keimig and Scott Martin’s new Night Photography book. Scott and Lance also teach star trail image stacking technique with LR/Enfuse at their week-long night photography workshops.
Do you mean 30 second exposures instead of 30 MINUTE exposures? I attempted a star trail before I stumbled over LR/Enfuse by shooting a time lapse made up of 4 minute exposures at f/2.8 and 100 ISO on the 5D Mk II and the result was a horrible amount of noise…!
Hey Jarryd! 30 second or 30 minute exposures – either way. Even 30 minutes can be short compared to the total exposure time required for long star trails.
Both of the images above were taken with the 5Dmark2. Interestingly, you’ll find that one of the huge advantages of image stacking is image noise reduction like you’ve never seen before! By shooting lots of individual frames instead of one large one, your RAW processing software can apply noise reduction to each and every frame, and then again on the composited file. The end results are incredible, high quality images, even from older noisy cameras.
Very neat Scott… I look forward to trying it out! Cheers for the extra information!
Another advantage to image stacking is that you have a bunch of frames to put together for a time lapse movie. Image stacking is really a great thing!
Currently traveling and unable to get the book. Tried tinkering with the parameters but the trails always become dimmer after “enfused”. Any pointers…?
Dear Scott,
Please please please could you and lance come to nz and teach some classes over here it would be amazing to learn of you guys im so passionate bout night photography i just started and they dont really teach anything about the way you and lance take photos at night. So im on here pleading to the masters please please please come to nz and teach us underprivlidged kiwis something different?:) just a thought. Think all your guys work is amazing as always…hope to be learning of you in nz soon:) x
Lo Yuk Fai – try brushing on clarity to your skies prior to enfusing. Yes, the parameters will effect this as well.
Hi Jennifer – thanks for your interest. Yes, we would LOVE to come to New Zealand and do some teaching and a few weeks of night photography. If you have a local organization that can organize it and gather participants, have them contact me and let’s put it together!