All was not drudgery, however. First, I became friends with a neighbor couple, who were extremely helpful. I wanted to thank them, and pondered a long time about what would be an appropriate gift. They love their land and the quiet, rural location where it is located. I also wanted to take advantage of the relatively dark skies and open vistas that the Eastern Shore provides. So, I concluded that a photo of the Milky Way arching over their home would be well-received as a gift and provide me the opportunity to improve my astrophotography skills.

Some research showed that an early-morning (that is, 2:00 or 3:00 am) would be a good time to collect images. (Astrophotography can lead to sleep deprivation.) I ended up making a two-row panorama of eleven images each. That became a rather challenging processing task, getting everything to line up. But, I did have success, and made a print 18″ wide to give to them. Here is the result:

My second astrophotography idea came when I researched about Harriet Tubman, whose home territory is Cambridge. The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitor Center is located nearby, bordering Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. I read that Tubman followed the North Star (Polaris) when leading her many groups of slaves to freedom in the North. I thought it would be fun to make an image of star trails around Polaris at the Visitor Center. That, of course, meant being there at night, and a cloud-free, Moon-less night at that! Given that I wasn’t living in Maryland, just working on my friends’ house–located an hour’s drive away–it was a while before sky conditions coincided with my ability to be present. The first attempt came in April, but was thwarted by too many planes and incoming clouds. Facing North from the Visitor Center meant pointing in the direction of several major airports. The second, and successful attempt came in June. By waiting until the wee small hours of the night (ironically, June 19th) I was able to minimize the number of planes crossing the field of view. Processing this image was also a challenge. Lights at the Visitor’s Center are not friendly to photographers, as the director had alerted me when I secured permission to be on the grounds after hours. So, the star trails were stacked from more than an hour’s worth of imaging, and the foreground part of the image was made earlier in the evening. Here is the result. I had a 12″x18″ metal print made to donate to the Museum.

The Moon rose behind the lighthouse (from our vantage point, at least), as predicted. I was using the equivalent of 1600mm, so the Moon looked huge on the screen. That was my intention. We watched as the Moon continued to rise and angle toward the south, thus separating itself from the lighthouse in the frame. As is usually the case with the Harvest Moon, the Moon was orange in color, due to the refraction of sunlight through the atmosphere. It was an impressive sight, for sure.

As I finished photographing and began to pack up my gear, we noticed the clouds and reflection in the water. That, too, was most impressive. Out came our phones so we could record that lovely experience. All in all, the evening was well worth the effort, and made more enjoyable by sharing with a friend.

Here are the results of my effort. For those of you who like detailed data, the camera was Olympus OM-D E-M1 mark iii; lens: M.Zuiko 100-400mm, with 2x teleconverter. Since Olympus cameras have a 2x crop factor, that’s 1600mm full-frame equivalent. Settings were 0.5 sec, f/12, ISO 800 for the first image, and 0.6 sec, f/18, ISO 800 for the second image. The third image was with my Google Pixel 3 phone, using the night sight feature.

When I read about how to use my smartphone to photograph the stars, I just had to try it. The results were surprising. That led me to consider a little experiment. On Monday, September 13, I set up in the driveway to do a comparison. What sort of results could I get with my phone, my infrared converted Olympus camera, and my regular Olympus camera? Let’s begin with the phone.

In the first image, looking northwest, you can actually see the Andromeda Galaxy. It’s the bright blob a little above and to the left of the center of the image. Of course it doesn’t look like an image from the Hubble telescope, but it is Andromeda, nonetheless. (Take a couple of minutes to watch the video.) The second image is a look straight overhead. Do you see the Milky Way? I was really surprised that a phone camera could reveal that. Looking up means looking through as little atmosphere and light pollution as possible. So I decided to put the phone to a real test–looking south. Lots of light pollution and haze there, but with some processing in LightRoom, you can see the Milky Way in the third image.

OK, so how do you do this? First of all, do not try this simply hand-holding your phone. You need to mount it on a tripod (there are products made for that purpose) or somehow get it to be steady by laying it on a rock or the ground. Anything so that it doesn’t move. Then, for an Android phone, set the camera for Night Sight. I’m sure there’s a similar setting for iPhones. Once you’ve got the phone resting steadily and you’ve set up the camera, press the shutter button. First the phone will go through a process of automatically focusing on the stars so they look like little pin-points of light. Then the camera will begin layering images on top of each other for about a minute. With this process it builds up light points without overexposing the background. Notice that this works best with as little light pollution as possible. For example, the overhead image is much better than the south-facing image. Give it a try! You may be surprised. I surely was.

Having noticed the haze in the south, I decided to compare my infrared converted (720nm) Olympus OM-D E-M5 mark ii camera with my regular Olympus OM-D E-M1 mark iii. I had noticed previously that the infrared camera seems to cut through light pollution better than the un-adapted camera. In both cases I simply pointed south and used the same lens, the M.Zuiko 12mm f/2.0. You can see the results in the next two images. On the left is the infrared image, on the right the regular image.

Some things to notice about these images. First, the infrared image is not perfectly in focus. I need to practice focusing more with that camera, I guess. But, notice that you can see the Milky Way better in that image than in the other one, or even in the phone image. The infrared camera can cut through haze and light pollution better than an un-adapted camera. While the un-adapted camera does not pick up the Milky Way as well, the stars are tack sharp. This is because of the Starry Sky Autofocus function the E-M1 mark iii camera employs. I must say, that is quite a sales point for me! One of the most difficult steps in astrophotography is getting the focus correct.

I hope you enjoyed this post. Stay tuned for more experimentation with the phone and the infrared camera.