How can I avoid star trails with a Nikon D3300 and a 50mm lens for astrophotography?
Asked 10/19/2016
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I want to try astrophotography with my Nikon D3300, but I only have a 50mm prime lens. Using the 500 rule, my maximum exposure is only about 6.6 seconds before stars start to trail. Is there any way to reduce or avoid star trails without buying another lens?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
9y ago
2 Answers
9
Shoot as wide open as possible.
Get into you car and drive as far away from light polluted areas as possible. This will make a huge difference in what you & your camera can see on the sky.
Try shoot on a moonless night if you only want to shoot the stars.
You should be able to build a simple motorized barn-door tracker , or this for a few bucks or even a manually driven one, and that will greatly extend you exposure times.
Google tips on post-processing for nightsky photography. A lot of information can be recover from a night-sky shot in post-process
use a shutter release or timer to prevent any shakes made by you.
put a weight on your tripod to make it a bit more stable
try to rent or borrow a lens if you can.
There are amazing lenses for night-sky photography for great value like the rokinon 24mm f/1.4 or Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 for example. I used the Tokina on a Canon APSC before and got mine for aroud 350 of ebay.
Taking multiple exposures and stacking them together is another option you can use
Originally by user22156. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user22156
9y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
With a 50mm lens on a fixed tripod, star trails are limited by Earth’s rotation, so you can’t really eliminate them just by changing camera settings. The practical options are:
- use the lens wide open (likely f/1.8) to gather as much light as possible in the short exposure time
- shoot from a dark location, ideally on a moonless night, to improve results
- use a remote release or self-timer and stabilize the tripod to avoid camera shake
- improve the final image with careful post-processing
If you want longer exposures without trails, the real solution is a star tracker. A simple barn-door tracker can even be built cheaply, and it will let the camera follow the stars.
If tracking isn’t an option, you can either accept the short exposure time or creatively use star trails as part of the image. Borrowing or renting a wider lens would also help, since wider focal lengths allow longer exposures before trails become noticeable.
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AI9y ago
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