Spooky Night Photography with Monsters! (sorta)

Okay, so I’m late with this post but I wanted to get my most recent shoot done because I wanted to use it as fodder for this blog post. And it looks like it paid off, because I’ve got a whole lot to talk about. So I’m a day late, but am I a dollar short?

What was the shoot?

Well, Monday night I sat down to learn how to use the Photo Pills app and, while going through the features, I found the Milky Way tracking feature. As I’m looking at this feature an idea pops into my head; according to this dongle (possibly) the band of the Milky Way is going to line up pretty well (maybe) with Guide falls, just outside Ridgley (all the parentheses are because I have no idea if I’m using Photo Pills right!). So what if I go out to Guide Falls late at night with my wide glass and try to get a photo showing the Milky Way flowing down into the falls? That would look funky!

Tuesday morning I set about researching the shoot. I have never tried to capture the Milky Way before, so my first move was to learn how to do it. Off to YouTube for some videos and Google for umpteen dozen site options. Much reading and viewing later, and I have learned that I need to be careful to get the right shutter speed. Too fast and the stars won’t pop, too slow and the stars will start to streak. Fortunately there is a formula to use to calculate the right shutter speed, supposedly.

Apparently you divide 500 by your focal length and that gives your optimal shutter speed, which is what I did. I divided 500 by 18mm and came out with 27 seconds (rounded down). That didn’t seem right. I couldn’t tell you why at the time, but it just felt wrong. Some of you might be asking, “What are you shooting with? If you have a crop sensor camera you have to multiply your focal length by, blah, blah...” Yep. That occurred to me, too, (after the fact *blush*) so I made that correction to my math. 500 divided by 27mm (18mm times Nikon’s 1.5 crop) equals 18 seconds (again, rounded down). That still didn’t feel right. My gut said 10 seconds, so I went with that.

My research also suggested going wide open aperture and high ISO. Wide aperture I’m fine with, but high ISO? My landscape body at the moment is my D3200. It has a nice big 24 megapixel sensor that brings out some very nice detail but, and this is a purely subjective observation, anywhere above 1600 ISO is just too noisy. If I wanted to shoot at 10 seconds, though, I would have to push it higher. So I could go with what the math told me, 18 seconds, and keep my 1600 ISO or I could go with my gut and stick to 10 seconds, cranking my ISO to 3200. I’m getting stubborn in my middle age, so I followed my gut and kicked my ISO to 3200.

I had my camera settings down (theoretically) and Photo Pills had given me a time to be at the falls to get my shot, so all I had to do was wait...

Until departure time. As usual, I departed an hour earlier than I needed to so I could be in position with plenty of time to set up and, maybe, get some nocturnal wildlife shots with the D7000 and a long lens. I was pumped -... No, check that. I wasn’t pumped. Pumped suggests a certain level of concerted effort to get energised for the shoot. There was none of that. No, I was genuinely excited; kid-at-Christmas-style excited. This was going to be fantastic fun!

So I blatted up winding mountain roads from Camdale to Ridgley (for blatted read ‘drove’ – I have enough scars from stupid driving, thank you!), swept down the road to West Ridgley, took the turn off to enter Guide Falls and stopped abruptly when I saw the heavy metal gate blocking the road. Behind the gate was a sign informing visitors that Guide Falls closed at 7.30pm every night. Huh? I thought How do you close a waterfall? Turn the tap off? But it was apparent that folk weren’t allowed to enter Guide Falls at night so, a little forlornly, I turned around and cruised home.

BUT!! Stubborn in my middle age thing, I was not to be deterred. Come hell or high water, I would shoot at night at Guide Falls! Full of courage and determination I strode into the foyer of Burnie City Council and demanded that I be allowed to take photos at night at Guide Falls!

To which I was told something along the lines of, “Oh yeah, go for it. We just close the gates so idiots can’t get in there and make a mess. You want to take photos? Go ahead. Enjoy!” (Okay, so that’s not really what happened. I was polite and inquisitive, they were friendly and accommodating. But I think my version is funnier, and the result was the same).

So once again I set up my camera and, at the appointed hour I once more sallied forth to take photos at Guide Falls. This time I wasn’t so excited on the drive. My sails had definitely had the wind sucked out of them... Until I arrived, that is.

I parked close to the gate (didn’t want my car totalled while I was away) pulled on the small back pack containing my landscape kit, threw on the small shoulder bag with the wildlife set-up in it and set off past the gate. The excitement began slowly to bubble to the surface once more as I went deeper and deeper into the park, each step taking me closer to a challenging and exciting shoot with the potential to produce some fantastic images.

Reaching the car park, I slowed not at all as I stepped up onto winding gravel path that rose and fell and twisted and turned with the landscape. There are absolutely no lights in the Guide Falls reserve, or on the road leading down to it. There was also no moon while I was there, so the path was lit only by the stars of a cloudless night and my little red head torch (I was using that so as not to disturb any wildlife in the area, applying what I was told on my Fairy Penguin adventure to the rest of my nature photography. I didn’t want to scare off any potential photos!) The babble of the running water seemed so much louder than it had during the day, the darkness muting my vision and amplifying the sound. The points at which the water fell were tumultuous, drowning out even the heavy crunch of my feet upon the path. And the combination of darkness and noise conspired to give me quite a shock when I looked down to see where the water was falling only to find I was bare inches from a drop into darkness. With a laugh at myself I continued on, the little scare putting a bit of a bounce in my step and goosing my excitement levels, if only a tad.

I finally reached the path to the base of the falls, and paused. You see, the path from the car park to this point is a nice man-made affair, all gravel and guard rails (hence the laughter at my little scare). The path from this point to where I wanted to set up for my shoot was made by Mother Nature, all water-worn rock, uneven surface and an easy fall into the river. Fortunately we haven’t had much rain on the Northwest Coast lately, so the river was lower than the last time I was out there and the rocks were quite a bit drier. Still, I took my time and freaked myself out a couple of times, once when I overbalanced and once when I slipped on the one bloody wet rock on the whole damn path! On reflection, though, it was an uneventful and comparatively short walk to my shoot location.

I set down my wildlife bag, took off my landscape bag and turned to take in the scene. There was the waterfall, a log that had obviously washed over the fall since the last time I was there, the various ledges and protrusions that deflected the falling water, some lovely rocks to serve as foreground and a nice band of stars rising above the falls. It looked like I hadn’t read Photo pills right because I couldn’t see the galactic centre, but there was still a shot there.

At last, it was time to set up and start shooting. Tripod out, legs set at differing lengths with feet in solid footings for stable shooting; camera and wide lens mounted on the tripod and locked firmly into position; me squat-sitting on a tiny rock ledge sticking out from cliff face behind me at the right height for me to work the controls. I switched on the camera, checked my settings, turned off my head lamp...

And couldn’t see a bloody thing – except the stars, of course. It was so tremendously pitch black I thought I was in a Vin Diesel movie. And it wasn’t that I wasn’t used to the light, either, because red lights are supposed to protect your night vision (not sure if that is fact or legend though). Just to be sure I gave my eyes a couple of minutes to adjust. Result? I could see more stars.

I mean, I was expecting darkness, I was taking photos at night so, yeah, dark. I just wasn’t expecting that much darkness. But I should have expected it, really. I was at the bottom of a 20+ metre tall waterfall, enclosed on three sides by cliffs, on the floor of a well-forested valley. Pitch black was going to be your lighting. But that was okay; I had a LED torch with me so I would use that give me light to compose by. Nope! The torch didn’t give enough illumination to show up in the viewfinder or on the rear screen, so composition and focus became a matter of trial and error.

First I found focus using the technique I saw during my Milky Way photography studies. I

wound focus out to infinitely, which was challenging given the lens I was using (right), took a photo and checked it on the rear screen. For the first shot I didn’t need to do the 100% zoom suggested to check focus because it looked like a pile of cotton wool. A few more shots to refine focus using the 100% zoom and focus was nailed. From there I used my torch to see the end of my camera lens and lined up the lens with the angle of view I wanted. That’s pretty much how I went about composition for the rest of the time I was out there, and I think it worked pretty well.

I was finally ready to shoot.

In my right hand I held the remote trigger for the camera, in my left I held my LED torch, ready to put it to the use for which it was brought. I pressed the remote trigger and set about painting the waterfall with torch light, watching for the little green tell-tale on the back of the camera to tell me the exposure was finished. I went on this way, recomposing and shooting and painting, for the rest of my time at the falls. Finally, I packed up my gear, put on my red head lamp and trudged back out. And that’s when the spooky fun-ness started.

I walked along the path, content with my night’s effort, gazing around the forest and drinking in the serenity. Suddenly, from out of the darkness, shone two bright red eyes, not blinking, not moving, just staring, staring, staring.

 Just as suddenly they disappeared.

Then, in the tree above, two bright, staring red eyes, suddenly there and, an instant later... Gone!

I reached the road and headed for the gate. There in front of me in the dark appeared luminous red eyes watching me as I passed. As I drew level with them they disappeared... And reappeared further down the road. They were soon joined by a second pair on the other side of the road. Then a third up in the tree. A sudden rustling of the brush beside the road and a small fleet figure dashes across the road in front of me, and all I can see is a flash blood red fur.

By the time I reached the car I was pretty much surrounded by luminous red eyes. I tell you what, if I hadn’t known they were possums and wallabies, I would have crapped my dacks!

I got home around midnight and imported my photos to Lightroom. I was still excited from the shoot and full of happy amusement from my scary critter adventure, so I decided to do at least my first cull and basic post-processing before I went to bed. The first cull took me from 132 photos to 21. Considering how much I could see, I’m pretty happy with that. All 21 shots range from ‘pretty good’ to ‘good enough to share on social media’ but, unfortunately, none of them are good enough for the portfolio. For a giggle, towards the end of the shoot, I tried a little something different. I’ve put one of those shots at the bottom of this post; what do you think?

But why didn't I get any portfolio shots? I have some theories.

First, as I’m sure you can see from the photo above, my wide lens is actually the kit lens that came with the D3200. On a DX body like that, the 18-55mm lens actually becomes a 27-82.5mm. I don’t think that’s wide enough to get the shot for which I was hoping. I think, on a DX body, I would probably want to get the Tokina 11-16mm F2.8. On a DX it becomes a 16.5-24mm. I might even want to go to a Sigma 8mm f/3.5 Circular Fisheye, but I’m not that fond of the idea of a circular fisheye and its not as fast as the Tokina. And I can’t help but think I want fast glass for this job, so the Tokina wins. If you have any other suggestions on wide fast glass for a Nikon DX, let me know!

Second, I have now done my middle-age-stubborn thing and shot at 10 seconds, so maybe I

should follow the math and see what I can get? Worth a try.

Third, I need to figure out how to use Photo Pills, but I find the interface daunting and I get the feeling you have to know all about tracking the sun and the moon and the stars, and the seasonal variances, to really be able to use the app. The video from which I learned all the Milky Way photography (I’ll put a link to it down below) suggested a program called Stellarium. I’ve had a look at it and so far I prefer it to Photo Pills, but time will tell...

Final thoughts:

                           I had a lot of fun last night. I tried a new genre of photography, I ventured through the night time forest into another world and I was stalked by legion of cute furry marsupials. I can’t think of a better night I have had in a long, long time.

I want to thank the folk at the Makers’ Workshop Information desk who directed me to the Burnie City Council, an the Council themselves for being friendly, helpful and informative. And don’t forget to take a look at ‘How To Photograph The Night Sky With Your DSLR: A Beginners Guide’ at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kmkTsmd2O0 if you want to give night sky photography a shot. They give detailed information and advice, and it’s a good video!

Have you done any night sky or Milky Way photography? How did it go? Where can I see the final results? Share you work with me and I’ll share your work with others. Let’s get ourselves out there, shall we?

Oh, and don't forget to check out my stuff at:
https://www.instagram.com/bobcartledgephoto/
https://www.facebook.com/bob.cartledge.758
https://bobcartledgephotography.myportfolio.com/
https://plus.google.com/u/0/112595622678884939511

SEE YA!