The Pillars Of The Sky By Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook The Pillars Of The

Grandstand at the La Playa Racetrack by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website Instagram Facebook This is "The Grandstand" in the Racetrack Playa in Death Valley. The Playa is a dry lake bed in Death Valley National Park. It lies in a relatively remote area, about a 4 hour drive from Furnace Creek, mostly down a rutted and sometimes rocky dirt road. This is not a road to hurry alone. There are many tales of flat or ruptured tires, and this is not a place to get stuck. The dry lake bed is sonic and unusual. It is best known for the "Sailing Stones" or "Walking Rocks". The Grandstand lies in the NW area of the Playa, and the Sailing Stones are better see more to the South. The Grandstand is a large rock formation arising from the dry lake bed. The photographer in the right foreground of the photo is Eric Gail. He masterminded the trip to the playa. Thank you Eric! You can see his excellent gallery here: www.flickr.com/photos/dot21studios Hey Eric, I'm going to need another model release! Maybe you can send me the name of your agent! Thanks for taking the time to look. Hope you enjoy! Big thanks to the wonderful Flickr family for all the support and encouragement! Cheers, Wayne

In Memoriam by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website Instagram Facebook IN MEMORIAM:, THE SENTINEL: The Sentinel in Bryce Canyon National Park fell on Nov. 25. It is seen here as the lighted spire just to the right of center. This was taken several years ago in an effort to accentuate the Sentinel. The spire was along the Navajo Trail which can be seen in the lower center of the image. The Sentinel was one of the named landmarks in the park. Farewell!

The Baobab by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook This is a huge, majestic Baobab Tree. It can be hard to capture the enormity of very large objects in a single image. We had several people with us that posed in front of the tree for reference, but they were dressed in camouflage clothing and pretty much disappeared in those photos. (Note to self: Camouflage clothing is not good for photos at night in the brush 😂). Anyway, I tried this vertical panorama, multiple horizontal photos moving upwards. That helped a little. There is Low Level Lighting (LLL) with 2 Cineroid LED light panels, set on a relatively neutral color temperature of around 4000-4200K. One is a primary light and one is a fill light. 14-24 mm lens, 14 mm, f/2.8, 15 seconds, ISO 6400. A big thanks to @worldpix for arranging the tour. WorldPix is a charity organization that used photography to raise money for charitable causes.

Questions and Answers

Do You Go Out Alone for the Night Photos?

Question: Thanks for sharing this fantastic photo. Question: Were you in the park alone? Do you travel with a group? I'm curious.I'm thinking about taking a trip out to Vegas to shoot the parks in the area and am thinking about doing some night shoots alone. Any thought?

Answer: Usually I go out at night alone, although that might not be the best choice for everyone. I have gone out a few times with workshops, and occasionally I find someone at the site and we shoot together. Being out there at night is something you have to get used to. A lot of people are unnerved by the isolation and darkness. This says a lot about our society. It is estimated that 80% of people in the USA have never seen the Milky Way. Many people ask me "what is that cloud in the sky"? Once there was a complete blackout in Los Angeles and people called the police to report a suspicious cloud hovering over the city. It was the Milky Way. We are not used to being out in the dark except for moving from place to place. And we are not used to being so utterly alone. I love the feel of being out there at night, but it is not for everyone. You need to be really careful. I wear really high boots and keep an eye out for potential rattlesnakes. I really pay attention to where I step, always. You have to make sure your footing is always secure, because you may be standing on rough ground or ledges and you are going to spend a lot of time with the lights totally turned off. Before I turn the lights off I look around and see just where it is safe to step. I always keep an eye out for any people or large game. Take bear spray for example. Anyway it has been safe for me so far, but you do need to be careful. Some people even take a dog with them! It's a great experience, but remember to think about how to be safe.

Cheers, Wayne

Perseverance by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook This is one of my favorite photos of this past summer. The photo is not really spectacular or anything like that, but this Ancient Bristlecone Pine looks like it has borne the weight of the world for millennia. I suspect it is several millennia old at least. It has taken all the abuse the earth could throw at it yet it persists, bent but not broken. In fact it seems to be quite healthy with a lot of foliage not shown here. Is there any better life lesson to learn? ________________________________________________ Low Level Lightening (LLL) used for lighting. A single Cineroid LED light panel was used, set on a 10 ft. (3 meter) light stand about 100 feet (30 meters) away, off to the left side. The light was turned all the way to low and set at a relatively neutral to slightly warm color temperature of 4200K. ________________________________________________11 light frames and one dark frame stacked in Starry Landscape Stacker. 14-24 mm lens, 20 mm, f/2.8, ISO 8000.

Questions and Answers

Star Trails

People have asked me a number of questions about equipment, issues, and technique in Nightscape or Landscape Astrophotography. Since many of these questions are recurring, I am going to post the questions and answers here. I’ll answer your questions to the best of my ability!

Q: Why don’t I see star trails in your 30 second exposure? Did you use a tracking device? I get star trails with my 24 mm lens at 30 seconds. 

A: There is no tracking device. If I was using a 24 mm lens or so, I would get star trails at 30 sec., but this was done with a 15 mm fisheye lens (I have corrected for distortion), and the wide Field of View makes the star trails so small that they are not visible unless you mag it up a lot. There is a simple guideline to avoid overly large star trails. Divide 500 by the focal length of the lens. So a 24 mm lens would be 500/24 = 20.8 seconds. You want to keep your exposures for a 24 mm lens under 20 sec, and for a 15 mm lens under 33 seconds. Most people call this the “Rule of 500″. If you are going to blow up the photo really large, then you could use 400 instead of 500.

Question and Answers

Using the Nikon 14-24 f/2.8  vs.  Rokinon-Bower 24 f/1.4 

Question: Wayne, do you shoot with the 24mm because there is less distortion when you stitch the images together? I'm just curious why the rokinon 24 vs say the Nikon 14-24 at 14mm , which is a wonderful lens. I understand the rokinon has a larger aperture but at 24 mm, max exposure time is reduced. Obviously you knocked this image out of the ballpark - would love to know a bit more about the lens choices for panoramas. Thanks and keep up the fantastic work.

Answer: Well, first of all, at 24 mm my version of the 24/1.4 is remarkably sharp, even at f/1.4. It is sharper and has less coma than the Nikon 14-24 at f/2.8. The Nikon is a wonderful lens, and is my most used and versatile lens, but if I am shooting at 24 mm then the 24/1.4 is better. Second, it lets in more light. I can push the histogram more to the right. There is some danger in overexposing the stars, and I was concerned about that, but it worked out. I actually took the pano at several settings and chose the best one. By pushing the histogram more to the right, I get much more detail in the foreground, and that was the goal. For example, some photographers have argued that if you shoot the same photo with an ISO of 6400 and 12,800, all other settings being equal, the 12,800 will actually have less noise in the darker foreground areas than the 6400 photo. The histogram is pushed to the right, the foreground looks lighter, asnd there is less noise there. This is because the dark pixels in the dark left side of the each have less information than the lighter pixels in the right side of the histogram. Less information in each dark pixel equals more noise in the image. The more you push the histogram to the right, the more information you have in each pixel and relatively less noise. Of course you have to avoid overexposing the sky. Overexposure is rarely a problem in night photography, lol. Anyway there are some people that advocate shooting at higher ISOs for that reason. There are discussions on the internet about it. Hope this helps! More light into the camera is good, especially when you are working at the limits of the cameras sensor!

The Wizard of Bisti by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: Website, Instagram, Facebook Part of a fantasy Series. New Mexico Badlands. Panorama, 11 images, 24 mm, f 2.0, 15 sec., ISO 8000. Low Level Lighting used. There is a light behind the hoodoos (not doing much, lol), and an LED light panel on a tripod behind me and to the left. For more images like this please take a look at Wayne Pinkston Photography . Thanks for all the kind support over the last year, it is much appreciated! A big thank you to the wonderful Flickr family!

Stillness Reigns Over The Alabama Hills by Wayne Pinkston Via Flickr: This was taken in the Alabama Hills in eastern California, near Mt Whitney. For those who have not been there, it is a wonderful place for night photography, or any landscape photography for that matter. There are numerous large rock collections separated by largely flat ground, making it easy to get around. This panorama was made from multiple vertical images shot at 14 mm, f/2.8, 20 sec., and ISO 10,000. Processed in Lightroom and Photoshop. My daughter served as my photo assistant this summer, and that is her standing on the rock.A big thank you to Eric Gail (www.flickr.com/photos/dot21studios/) for finding this spot. Thanks for taking the time to look. Hope you enjoy! Big thanks to the wonderful Flickr family for all the support and encouragement! Please join me at: Website Facebook Instagram Blog

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Colorado, at night. This was taken near the end of August along the North or NE side. The Visitors Center and primary roads are along the South side, but the North side is much quieter. I was not aware of this park until I was introduced to it by @pinkstonian. For "Lord of the Rings" fans, this is as close to Mordor as you might ever see. The canyon is very dark, narrow, and deep. In some places it is much deeper than wide. The dark rock is much different than the red rock canyons of nearby Utah and Arizona. This is a composite of 2 images, 20 sec, ISO 12,800 for the sky, 300 sec, ISO 1600 for the foreground, both at 14mm, f2.8. Cheers, Wayne http://waynepinkstonphoto.com