[simpbow]

Never done this before but would like to give it a go, anybody got any good tips to what i should do? cameras a Nikon D70 with
1. Tokina 12-24
2. Nikon 18-70
3. Nikon 70-210
Should be a good time to give it a try with mostly clear Sky's for the next couple of days. Thanks for any help, Simpbow.

[stepheno]

Originally Posted by simpbow

Never done this before

Niether have I but bulb for about two hours seems in order

[orangepeel]

finding the pole star will give u a nice circular trail.

make sure your battery is well charged.

bring a book

find your viewfinder cover thingy. you'll need it.

get as far away from towns and cities as u can.

if you've got a torch, bung some sort of red filter over it. it'll help save your night eyes.

If the D70 has it, you could turn on the noise reduction but it'll double your exposure time...

wrap up REALLY warm. u won't be moving around much so expect to get cold.

[simpbow]

Cheers guys thanx for that, should of said to i have a remote to so i can up the time, that should make a difference to i think, also what settings would yous use [aperture & lens]?

[orangepeel]

personally, I didn't like telephoto for star trails. it just looked to me like lots of parallel lines to me. preferred the effect of a wide angle coz u could get some landscape silhouette in too. that's down to taste tho.

as for aperture etc. i just set at my lenses sweet spot then decide how long i want the trails to be.

They are noticeable (pixel peeping) after about 10 seconds but for nice ones you are talking minutes.

Assuming there is no, or very little, light pollution, your maximum time is really dictated by your patience. Most I've done is 2-3 minutes - coz i got cold

if u get to the coast and point over the water you'll get less pollution - specially if you point over the atlantic

ooo and bring a powerful torch with you. if u find a tree or some other foreground interest you could also do a bit of light painting...

[simpbow]

Cheers OP I'll give it ago & see what i come up with.

[simpbow]

Very impressive looking site OP.

[orangepeel]

cheers.

all this talk is making me wanna head out this evening too wonder if there are any meteor showers on atm...

[AQ]

I do not know if you have ever looked at the NASA APOD site. I love it

If you go there and put "Trails" into the search engine you will get lots of inspiration. I did find this idea which may make your job much quicker but probably much less comfortable

APOD: 2007 May 19 - Circum-axial Leaf Trails

[Bill too]

I tried some shootiong star shots of the Perseids on the 13 of August last year.
The image above is a composite of 7 photos.
Exposures were 32 seconds at f4 with a 24mm focal length and iso 3200 with a Canon D5 (Note full frame).
The originals were affected by street lights so they have been reproduced in B/W.