E-M5 Mark III settings for night and star trails?

[LowriderS10]

Hi all,

I'm trying to find the least noisy settings for night photos and star trails. Generally, for star trails I use 30s and the lowest possible ISO. For night photos, I use base ISO and leave the shutter open for as long as possible.

However, a friend of mine (a very enthusiastic m4/3 shooter) suggested that Live Bulb is best for star trails (I haven't been happy with Live Comp...but I'll give it another shot) and he said that he gets cleaner results using higher ISOs and slightly overexposing them for night photos.

What are your experiences/suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[comment23]

I expect your friend was referring to live comp.

 

[banest]

Hi all,

I'm trying to find the least noisy settings for night photos and star trails. Generally, for star trails I use 30s and the lowest possible ISO. For night photos, I use base ISO and leave the shutter open for as long as possible.

However, a friend of mine (a very enthusiastic m4/3 shooter) suggested that Live Bulb is best for star trails (I haven't been happy with Live Bulb...but I'll give it another shot) and he said that he gets cleaner results using higher ISOs and slightly overexposing them for night photos.

What are your experiences/suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[banest]

I use Live Composite (f/2.8, 30 seconds, ISO 800) for star trails; let it go at least 40 minutes.

For Milky Way shots, I usually light paint an interesting foreground using Live Compisite. For the Milky Way sky, I use a wide angle (e.g. 9mm) at f/2.8, ISO 5000, for 20 seconds.

 

[banest]

Here are a couple of examples using these techniques:

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[banest]

I should mention I am referring to an Olympus OM-D E-M1. The sensor in the E-M1 Mk I is very noisy in low light exposures, unless using Live Composite mode. My old E-M1 Mk I was used for the light trail image, the E-M1 Mkiii was used for the MW image.

 

[LowriderS10]

@banest Those are superb shots...thanks for sharing them! Do you still find that the Live Comp is your best (least noisy) option for star trails and night shots with your E-M1.3?

@comment23 Thanks, I meant to say Live Comp (I've edited it). I went shooting with Live Comp last night and I think I like the results...I have to get them off the card and look at them on my computer, but examining them closely on the LCD looked very good. Of course it does have the tiny drawback of not being able to ditch a frame if it's ruined, but I think that's worth it, given how clean the images are!

 

[banest]

@banest Those are superb shots...thanks for sharing them! Do you still find that the Live Comp is your best (least noisy) option for star trails and night shots with your E-M1.3?

@comment23 Thanks, I meant to say Live Comp (I've edited it). I went shooting with Live Comp last night and I think I like the results...I have to get them off the card and look at them on my computer, but examining them closely on the LCD looked very good. Of course it does have the tiny drawback of not being able to ditch a frame if it's ruined, but I think that's worth it, given how clean the images are!

Live Comp is the bomb for star trails, light painting, lightning, fireworks, car trails, etc. For Milky Way shots, you don’t use Live Comp - you don’t want trails or streaks for a MW shot. Just single, ordinary exposures. Possible options are to shoot just one MW shot, or one MW shot with a noise reduction dark frame, or a sequence of single shots to stack in a star stacker program to reduce noise.

 

[LowriderS10]

So I'm not sure what's going on...but one of my Live Comp photos turned out awesome. The other...not so much. Things look, for lack of a better word, plasticky. I took a shot of the city, but the buildings, etc look weird and unnatural. What's going on? (Original with 100% crops...on a sturdy tripod with the 40-150 Pro at around 100mm)

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[LowriderS10]

Here's the same shot out of a regular image...I don't think I changed ANYTHING between these two images...it appears that the focus didn't quite get it right, but there's still a huge difference...

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[Danny_SWE]

Wow, found this thread when googling the matter.
I also found this page:
http://www.steves-digicams.com/blog/astrophotography-tips-and-tricks/

From there I extracted the following short tips:


Milky Way

For shooting the Milky Way, face south, ensuring there are no towns or clouds in that direction. Also try to find a foreground of some kind. I like to use cactus because I live in the Sonoran Desert.

To help get you started, try out the following settings — ISO 1600 at f/2 for 25 seconds in Bulb Mode. After trying these, play around with your own settings.


Live Composite: Capturing Star Trails

You can use Google Sky to help you identify the North Star. The star trails will form a circle around the North Star.
The long exposure star trails make very cool photos, but you may also want to include something in your foreground.

I like a majestic cactus, mountains or lakes.

On the Olympus E-M5 Mark II, E-M1 and E-M10 there is a new feature called Live Composite Mode. It is found in M mode under shutter speed (just past Bulb). I start by setting my camera up on a tripod and pointing the camera toward the North Star. Next, I set the lens to “manual focus,” and then do a few test shots to adjust for focus and framing. You will need to set up the refresh rate on the Live Comp. (I like to get an update every 20 or 25 seconds.) Once you have that done, the camera will need to take a black shot.

Don’t worry, the camera will make you do this through the Live Composite Mode. This will help the camera process the image.

Here are some basic settings for your first shot:

• ISO 1250 at f/2.0 for 20 minutes.
• Hyper focus the lens (place it in manual and set to infinity)
• Set your white balance to CWB (custom) and adjust to 3700K

Now that you have all that done, push the shutter down; once to start it, and a second time to stop it.

 

[comment23]

So I'm not sure what's going on...but one of my Live Comp photos turned out awesome. The other...not so much. Things look, for lack of a better word, plasticky. I took a shot of the city, but the buildings, etc look weird and unnatural. What's going on? (Original with 100% crops...on a sturdy tripod with the 40-150 Pro at around 100mm) View attachment 843279 View attachment 843280

View attachment 843278

Here's the same shot out of a regular image...I don't think I changed ANYTHING between these two images...it appears that the focus didn't quite get it right, but there's still a huge difference... View attachment 843281

Those appear to be out of focus. No need for such a wide aperture and low ISO either. Noise is averaged out to some extent with multiple exposures. Any of these equivalents would have been more flexible:

• f/5.6 and ISO200
• f/8 and ISO400
• f/11 and ISO800

 

[Celcius]

I did a time lapse with my E-M1 Mark III and didn't take advantage of Live Composition but did a more time consuming images stacking in PP.

 

[LowriderS10]

Those appear to be out of focus. No need for such a wide aperture and low ISO either. Noise is averaged out to some extent with multiple exposures. Any of these equivalents would have been more flexible:

• f/5.6 and ISO200
• f/8 and ISO400
• f/11 and ISO800

Thanks...they do look slightly out of focus, but they look MORE out of focus than the single frame exposure, even though I don't think I touched anything, other than to switch to LC. It looks a lot like the overprocessed high ISO stuff I'd see out of my old Canon S100.

I've been hearing different things about the noise and the multiple exposures. A friend (same friend as above...very well versed in the m4/3 universe) said that the camera takes ONE base image (at the start of the exposure) and then simply adds to that only information that changes (ie: a passing car, stars, etc)...this is how I understood it. Which means that any noise that was captured in the initial image would be present in the final one, as the dark parts of the image are only recorded once. Hence, I was trying to keep the ISO as low as possible.

I might go out one night when I have nothing interesting to shoot and simply do back-to-back comparisons with LC, same scene, same conditions, different ISOs, just to see how it works.

I went out again last night and shot a 1.5 hr Live Comp...I'll post it up as soon as I get it off the card!

 

[LowriderS10]

I did a time lapse with my E-M1 Mark III and didn't take advantage of Live Composition but did a more time consuming images stacking in PP.

Yeah, I've done tons of those. I'm just trying to figure out how to best use LC, and whether it is superior to the 200 shots and stack them method.

 

[banest]

Thanks...they do look slightly out of focus, but they look MORE out of focus than the single frame exposure, even though I don't think I touched anything, other than to switch to LC. It looks a lot like the overprocessed high ISO stuff I'd see out of my old Canon S100.

I've been hearing different things about the noise and the multiple exposures. A friend (same friend as above...very well versed in the m4/3 universe) said that the camera takes ONE base image (at the start of the exposure) and then simply adds to that only information that changes (ie: a passing car, stars, etc)...this is how I understood it. Which means that any noise that was captured in the initial image would be present in the final one, as the dark parts of the image are only recorded once. Hence, I was trying to keep the ISO as low as possible.

I might go out one night when I have nothing interesting to shoot and simply do back-to-back comparisons with LC, same scene, same conditions, different ISOs, just to see how it works.

I went out again last night and shot a 1.5 hr Live Comp...I'll post it up as soon as I get it off the card!

My latest Live Composite field workflow is below, as best as I remember it last night:

1) I scouted out the hoodoo that afternoon, and found an approximate shooting spot to line up the hoodoo with Polaris, the North Star, using my iPhone compass in the daytime.

2) I returned to my shooting spot at dusk. Setup tripod/camera, and framed up my desired composition with alignment to the hoodoo and true north. I decided I would take two images, and combine them using PS in post. First image would be done using Live Composite - I would light paint the hoodoo and foreground. I use a simple LED flashlight, lighting from both sides of the hoodoo. You don’t light paint from your camera position - that yields no shadows or detail - just flat and featureless.

3) So, I waited for it to get dark enough to light paint. I used the camera meter and test shots to establish that at f/5.6 and ISO 400, a 15 second exposure on Live Composite was what I wanted to light paint at. The moon was partially out, and any longer than 15 seconds started revealing more of the hoodoo than I wanted. At that point, I kicked off a LC sequence. I started light painting a little bit at time, and then went back to look at the result on the LCD. I did the painting in four steps, adding a bit more each time, after looking at the LCD. I called it good at that point. I normally take several shots, and then the choose the best, but not tonight - the footing around this hoodoo was steep and gravelly, making it treacherous. I was pretty sure I got a good result on my first painting.

4) At that point, I was ready to shoot for star trails, but I had to wait a while for it to get even darker. When it was dark enough, I took some more tests shots (did not move the tripod at all), and established that at f/2.8 and ISO 800, 25 seconds base exposure looked good. From past experience, I know that a 40 minute star trail LC shot yields good results. So, I calculated that 96 25 second frames would give me 40 minutes. So, I started it, and the rest is history.

I hope that helps someone!!

 

[LowriderS10]

@banest Thanks for the write-up and that's a fantastic image, though not quite what I'm trying to get at, since it's a stack of more than one image...the result is beautiful, but I'm trying to get to the bottom of JUST LC.

 

[LowriderS10]

So...I was out again last night...does LC do long exposure noise reduction??!!

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)