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I love the stars, there is nothing better than laying down on a grass field, far away from the city lights and just looking up at the night sky. If you are like me than you will want to try to capture the beauty of the

stars on your camera. Ben Canales is an amazing night time photographer, he has put together a basic video guide to takeing some amazing night time photos.

Some things to keep in mind when taking photos of the stars:

Have a plan and know where you are going.
Prepare: check the weather, bring a flashlight, know your camera, check your camera, bring and use a tripod and preset your camera.
Turn off auto-focus.
Use your cameras timer to reduce camera movement.
Take photos in RAW (if available).
Crank up your ISO (2000-4000).
Open up the aperture.
The rule of 600 or 400 helps you determine the max exposure you can set your camera to, before you will see star trails.
- For full frame cameras take 600 and divide it by the focal length of your lens.
- For crop body cameras take 400 and divide it by the focal length of your lens.
- If you have a 20mm lens, take 600/20 = 30 seconds so you can set your camera to 30 seconds, or 400/20 = 20 seconds.
Watch out for clouds.
Point your camera away from cities otherwise light pollution may show up in your photos.
Take lots of photos.
Take some time to enjoy the sky and have fun.

If you liked this then make sure you check out our Low Light Photography Tips- Infographic and our three part series on low light photography: Low Light Photography Tips, Low Light Cameras and Equipment, and Fixing Underexposed Photos.

Snapsort’s Low Light Photography Infographic

Taking photos in low light takes some practise to perfect, we have put together a great guide to help you master the art of low light photograph. Tips for taking low lights shots, low light cameras and equipment, and even a infographic on low light photography tips to bring it all together. We hope you enjoy.

Underexposed photographs can be salvaged using post-processing software. If you’re shooting in RAW format, even more post-processing capabilities are available to you. Sometimes it’s beneficial to purposefully underexpose a shot, especially if you’re shooting hand-held in dim lighting situations. It’s better to get a shot that’s a bit underexposed but salvageable, rather than a properly exposed but blurry photograph.

For the purposes of this discussion, I will be editing a photo using Adobe Bridge, Camera Raw 6.3 and Photoshop CS5. However, many of the features and basic steps are applicable in other programs.

First, here is the (purposefully) underexposed shot, a still life of my morning:

This photo was shot in RAW format, so when it is opened from Adobe Bridge, it brings up the Camera Raw (6.3) panel:

The first thing I usually do is click on “Auto” to see what settings Camera Raw would recommend for this photograph:

As you can see, the “Auto” settings may not be appropriate for this shot. The increased exposure and brightness blew out portions of the image. To undo the automated settings, simply click on “Default” to bring the settings back to where they originally were. Now play with the various sliders, primarily “Exposure”, “Recovery”, “Fill Light”, “Blacks”, “Brightness”, and “Contrast” to achieve the desired appearance. As each slider is moved, a preview of the changes can be seen.

Once the desired appearance is achieved, click on “Open Image” to open the image in Photoshop. If no more adjustments are needed, save the file as a JPEG. In this case, some noise reduction and sharpening was in order. Here is the final image:

Quite a difference from the original, and the adjustments only took me approximately two minutes!

In a future article we will discuss fixing JPEG photos using adjustment layers in Photoshop.

Photo credits: Tiffany Joyce

Tag: raw

Taking photos of the stars

Fixing Underexposed Photos in Camera Raw