I'm in Moab Utah and I hope to take a photograph of False Kiva which is a ancient Puebloan stone circle with the Green River and various rocky monoliths in the background. I hope to photograph the Milky Way in the sky.

I saw a photograph taken at this location in the British press some time ago and basically I hope to copy it. I've just tried to upload a photograph of the location, hopefully that went through ok.

Can anyone tell me if I'm on the right track, if I need to make any changes I'd appreciate your feedback as I'll only get a couple of chances at this.

I'm using a Canon 5DMKII with a 24-105 lens. I will of course use a tripod and I have a remote release. The 21st July is a new moon which I assume is the best time to try this shot, again I'm assuming a day or two either side won't harm.

I hoped to be able to shoot at 28mm so I would get the stone circle in the shot, this also allows some other details. I'm intending to make it a quick exposure so as not to get star trails, however, I'd also like to try a long exposure assuming I manage something interesting with the fast exposure.

It was suggested to me that if I shoot at F4 for 30 seconds at 3200asa I might get a good shot. Also I wanted to try to ''Paint'' the circle with a torch. It's been suggested I do this for approximately 8 seconds.

So just to go over that:
A 30 second exposure at F4 shot at 28mm at 3200asa, with 8 sec's of ''painting'' time.

For star trails I assume I'd use a lower asa and obviously a longer exposure.
CAN ANYONE GIVE ME A FEW TIPS ON THIS. ARE MY FIGURES RIGHT. WHAT IS THE BEST TIME IN THE NIGHT FOR SUCH A SHOT???

Thank you.

This should be helpful
http://www.astropix.com/GADC/SAMPLE7/SAMPLE7.HTM

The best time of night would be after astronomical twilight, when the sky is darkest. So roughly between 10:30pm and 4:30am local time, you can get the latest times from http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findwe...uSelect=WEATHER

The best advice is just keep shooting and experiment with exposure.

That is indeed best advice.

If you're proficient with post-processing, it might be worthwhile to do one exposure for the rocks (perhaps painting with light), and one for the milky way, and combine them in post.

Thank you both I'm going to study this in depth.

You'll find how this was done in this thread.

http://digg.com/space/Amazing_photo_of_Mil..._seen_it_before

sorry if you have already seen this

The 24-105 will not open enough for that type of shot and shooting at 3200 may show some banding in the sky. One thing to keep in mind is that, essentially, the quantum efficiency of the Canon sensors has not evolved much over the years (this is why unfiltered 300D and 350D cameras remain a good choice for amateur astronomers). The increase in sensitivity one has become used to in every day shooting is mostly the result of better in-camera processing. Also, pay attention to the Moon and the sky at the time you go there. The Moon can really spoil milky way shots. The original photographer chose a moment where the most picturesque area of the sky was neatly aligned and the Moon was just right to provide some landscape lighting without spoiling the sky.

Do you think I'm wasting my time at F4?, a buddy of mine could lend me his 35-70 F2.8.

interestingly I have a QTVR head so could attempt a stitch just like Wally's.

One heads up - I have heard that the False Kiva site is now closed to access, from a pro photographer who is leading a workshop in that area this fall. He tells me that he spoke with Canyonlands NP personnel.

I suggest that you check with the park rangers at Canyonlands NP to verify this.

Paul

In general, fully open photographic lenses are not too good for astrophotography. Both the 300/2.8 and the 85/1.2 I own - otherwise outstanding lenses - clearly show their limits compared to my dedicated 550/2.7 FFC. He mentions using a 24mm lens at 2.5 - my best guess is that he used a 24mm 1.4 stopped down. If you stop your lens down, it will become a bit slow imho. Also, as the original photographer explained, he had to stitch several pictures, you'll need a relatively flat field to stitch without cheating too much or risk having distorted stars at the seams. I do not own the 24/105 lens, but I suspect it suffers from some barrel distortion at 24mm... this will be quite annoying. Try a few things on your night sky before going there.

This being said, don't let anything I say stop you. If I was there, I would definitely attempt to replicate/imitate that shot, with a point and shoot if I only had that.

PS: one more thing I forgot to say - if you are shooting for the screen or web and stitching four/five shots, you'll have more than enough pixels to downsize the image and hide eventual star trails/defects., as long as you aren't pixel peeping.

I just got back from False Kiva, so I can say to Paul that his workshop photographer is talking out of his behind. The N.Park has no problems with people accessing False Kiva.

Anyway, I arrived at 3.30am, I wanted the moon to be somewhat round to the east so it would light up the cliff which is to my right as I look out of the cave. I had my camera mounted on a Nodal Ninja NN5 QTVR head. My problem was that at 3200 asa I really needed longer than a 30 second exposure and without a stopwatch I couldn't calculate this. So I tried 5000asa and I seemed to get nice results if a tad grainy. When I came to Stitch Photoshop CS4 couldn't match the images and I've yet to get to grips with Pt-gui.

I'm going to try again tonight by taking a single image of the kiva lit with a torch and a single image of the stars. Visibility should improve as the moon gets smaller over the next day or two.

Thanks to all for your advice, if I get something interesting I'll post it on the site.

Andrew

Andrew, you and my friend may both be right. I gave him your information and he's trying to verify that only COMMERCIAL trips like workshops are no longer able to access False Kiva, whereas private individuals still can.

Paul