Silhouette Curves In The Starry Night

Title

Silhouette Curves In The Starry Night

Artist

Mike Berenson

Medium

Photograph

Description

If you ask me, Irene shows her best side on first approach. From the first time I scouted Lake Irene before I did workshops there, I was drawn to the way the trees framed this view of reflected beauty ahead as the trail first reaches the lake.

On this night photography workshop in Rocky Mountain National Park, I encouraged my students to be patient while some wet weather finished rolling through the park. I did some in-field training and we headed to the first spot on my list - Lake Irene. Shortly after we arrived, the clouds cleared and the Milky Way finished rotating into perfect position.

I did some light painting for this and other images but decided that the lack of artificial light looked even better. I really liked how the trees on the near side (on the right) seemed to work with the ones on the far side (on the left) to leave gentle curves of starry night skies without the light painting detracting from that flow. Besides, I really liked how the Milky Way skies looked against the trees.
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How I Got The Shot
I think the biggest factor in getting this shot was just being in the right place at the right time. We got to the lake right as the clouds cleared laving especially pretty conditions - no wind resulting in calm water reflections of the Milky Way stars above.

I got this shot and a couple more from the same location while shooting & teaching a night photography workshop. After we arrived at the lake, we got in position to shoot from varying compositions along the shoreline while I light painting during each exposure.

In post-processing, I blended two exposures because the clouds seemed to block important parts of the Milky Way in both. I added a couple of adjustment layers and a slight crop in Photoshop before finishing with Nik's Color Efex Pro to add some contrast to the Milky Way.

Photo Gear
� Camera Body -�Nikon D800 Digital SLR Camera
� Camera Lens -�Nikon AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G Autofocus Lens
� Tripod Head -�FEISOL CB-50DC Ballhead with QP-144750 Release Plate
� Tripod Legs -�FEISOL Elite CT-3472 Rapid Tripod Legs
� Remote Trigger -�Vello FreeWave Micro Wireless Remote Shutter Release for Select Nikon DSLRs

Exposure Settings - Two Exposures with variation in the clouds
� ISO: 6400
� Aperture: f/2.8
� Shutter Speed: 30 seconds

Uploaded

April 28th, 2014

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