Learn the basics of Landscape Astro/Milkyway photography.

LIMITED TO FOUR PEOPLE ONLY

These workshops are limited to two or three people so that I can give you the utmost attention required in order for you to get the best out of your nights shooting. Adverse Weather date will be Friday the 21st - we will watch the forecast and decide which nights suits best for the conditions. Full refunds given if the skies are not clear for both evenings. Alternate locations will be discussed if I find agreeable weather within a couple of hours drive of Hamilton (Likely Whangamata or Pauanui - will not be further than Lake Tarawera)

BE PREPARED FOR A VERY LATE NIGHT!

At this time of year the Milkyway core is rising after 8 or 9pm, so it is more than likely we will be out until close to midnight or even later!

The following two blog posts are well worth a read to get an idea on what you should bring with you and how I go about planning these excursions out into the night!

The JarredSpec Introduction to Milkyway Landscape Photography - Part I: Gear

The JarredSpec Introduction to Milkyway Landscape Photography - Part II: Planning

To summarise what you should bring with you:

An interchangeable lens camera (DSLR or Mirrorless), and a wide angle lens. I’m hard and fast on this piece of equipment - Not saying that this sort of stuff can’t be done with point and shoots, “bridge” cameras or to some extent and even smartphones these days, but we’re going to start with people who have already invested in some dedicated photography gear. The lens ideally should be wide angle and have a maximum aperture of f/3.5 or faster at its widest focal length. This is still not ideal, but I’m aiming this at beginners who most likely have an 18-55mm kit lens with their camera.

Tripod: This is a must. Shooting the Milkyway comes under the umbrella of “Long Exposure Photography” and as we will be having our shutters open for up to and sometimes longer than 30 seconds, the camera needs to be held in place without it being able to be shaken. I will have a couple of spare tripods available if necessary.

WARM CLOTHES. You’re going out at night for several hours. No ones needs to bring Hypothermia home along with their epic Milkyway shot.

Editing Software: To bring the best out of the Milkyway, we will be shooting RAW and processing the Image. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop are probably the most popular editing tools worldwide and are what I use to edit all of my images. Worth the purchase!

What to expect:

• A live demonstration of what settings to use (and how to get to them) along with useful tips and tricks to compose your shot.

• Some basics of planning your Astro shoot using the Photopills app

• Q&A in the field while shooting

• an editing session over zoom in the following week or so afterwards showing basic editing techniques in Adobe Lightroom

• a discussion about stacking Milkyway images for noise reduction. (If we have time we’ll do this too)