It’s been another interesting year in my world, but I did make time to get out for some successful Milky Way shoots. It seems like I never get out as much I would like, and that is because of a variety of reason like weather, smoke, client work, and even my own motivation. Yes, even I find it hard to get out in the middle of night sometimes, even if it does seem like conditions will be really good. We’ve finally had some good Northern Lights shows in Alberta this year, too. I did make sure to get out for those and was lucky enough to avoid crowds for the most part.
Last year, I started using an astromodifed camera for a lot of my Milky Way photos. This year, I sold my astromodified d810 and got an astomodified z6ii so almost all my gear is mirrorless now. Spencer’s Camera did the modification again, and as always they did great work and were super easy to work with. Each year, my processes seem to get a little bit more complicated. And you’ll see at the end of this post, I added another level of difficulty to some of my night images.
Here’s the 2024 list of favourite Milky Way images. I’ve included some notes on settings and techniques used in night photography.
Ephemeral Ice
These ice formations immediately drew my attention. I wanted to capture their intricate details, so I waited until Astronomical Twilight to start shooting. As the sky brightened, it brought out more texture in the foreground, but the Milky Way was starting to fade, losing some of its detail and colour. I loved the overall cool, icy tones throughout the image, though.
Technical:
Sky: ISO6400 f2.8 14mm 10s
Foreground: ISO1600 f2.8 14mm 30s
Nikon z8 + Nikkor 14-24 f2.8
Stacked + Focus Stack + Blend
Beyond Darkness
Pulling out a lot of detail in the Milky Way does take more equipment than just a camera and lens. I was using my Sky Watcher Star Adventurer to track the sky, allowing me to run longer exposures and bring my ISO down for more colour and dynamic range in the image.
Technical:
ISO800 f1.4 40mm 30s x9
Nikon d810 astromodified + Sigma 40mm f1.4
Tracked & Stacked
Morant's Night Train
Getting a train at Morant’s Curve takes some luck and patience. There’s no official train schedule for Morant’s Curve because Canadian Pacific Railway (CP Rail), which operates the trains on that route, doesn’t publicly share specific timetables for its freight trains. To get the light trails I did in the photos, the train needs to be heading west. The first image is my favourite of the two. It’s the lights in the middle of the train. The second image with the red dots is the End of Train light that blinks. In a long exposure, the blinking lights turn into red dots, or streaks depending on where the train is on the curve.
To create this image, I took my sky and foreground images then left the camera and tripod in place hoping a train would come. You can both hear and see the lights from the train before it comes into view on the tracks along the Morant’s Curve area. I set the camera to run as a timelapse to catch the train lights as it passed.
Technical:
Sky: ISO6400 f2.8 14mm 15s x9
Foreground: ISO6400 f2.8 14mm 30s x9
Train lights: ISO3200 f2.8 14mm 30s
Nikon z8 + Nikkor 14-24 f2.8
Stacked & Blended
Stone and Stars
This is one of those locations that I’ve had in mind for many years and had to be very patient for weather, smoke-free skies, and my schedule to line up. I thought my zoomed-in tracked Milky way photos would be my favourites from here, but I love this scene the most. I waited for twilight to get more detail and colour in the foreground – the greens, greys, and orange lichen on the large rock.
Technical:
Sky: ISO6400 f2.8 14mm 15s x9
Foreground: ISO6400 f2.8 14mm 30s x9
Nikon z8 + Nikkor z14-24 f2.8
Stacked, Blended, & Focus Stacked
Night Sight
To finish my Milky Way season, I decided to get even more complicated with my process. I purchased a Astronomik Hydrogen-Alpha (Ha) clip-in filter, which I had been eyeing for a while. This filter isolates the Ha wavelengths, 656nm reds, and blocks all other wavelengths. I can pull out more nebulosity in the Milky Way and other features like the circular Zeta Ophuchi nebula to the right. I’ll write more on this process later as I’ve only experimented with the filter twice when this blog was published.
Technical:
Sky: ISO400 f4 14mm 120s x3
Foreground: ISO800 f4 14mm 4s
Nikon z6ii astromodified + Nikkor z14-24 f2.8
Tracked & Blended
Favourite Non Milky Way Shot
I think nature knows when you really want to get an image lined-up and tries to mess you. After many cloudy nights, a few clear sky windows showed up in the weather forecasts. Along with -40C temperatures. There are few things as fun as trying to work a Star Tracker and do night photography in -40C. It was worth it, I think! I will probably be going back and trying to get this same image with the new clip-in filter I have and see how much more nebulosity I can pull out.
Technical:
ISO800 f2 40mm 60s x 3
Nikon d810 astromodified + Sigma 40mm f1.4
Tracked, Stacked, Blended, Panorama