{"id":3751,"date":"2015-09-07T03:43:20","date_gmt":"2015-09-07T02:43:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tazmpictures.com\/site\/?p=3751"},"modified":"2025-10-16T14:46:38","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T13:46:38","slug":"stars-over-shenandoah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tazmpictures.com\/site\/?p=3751","title":{"rendered":"Stars over Shenandoah"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s Labor Day weekend in the Shenandoah Valley and it’s \u00a0packed with tourists escaping to the country to enjoy the fresh air, nature and sunshine. \u00a0I wonder how many of them noticed the night sky?<\/p>\n

\"DSC04234\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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I used a low ISO to cut down on “noise” – but this means a 30 second exposure. \u00a0The stars look blurry but if you look closely you’ll see that they are all tiny lines, due to the earth’s rotation while the camera shutter is open. \u00a0I took a series of photos that link all of these tiny lines together and form star ‘trails’.<\/p>\n

I started by locating the north star. \u00a0In the northern hemisphere this forms the point around which all of the other stars rotate. \u00a0Then I found a stationary object on earth to make the picture more interesting. \u00a0We’re in a cabin surrounded by trees that are constantly moving, so the cabin’s chimney was the best I could come up with. \u00a0I took 81 photos over a series of about 45 minutes that all looked about like this:<\/p>\n

\"DSC04289\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I plugged them into Lightroom to doctor them up a little and then used Startrails to stack them all, and came up with two different versions. \u00a0Which is better?<\/p>\n

\"Star<\/a>