High ISO does not really help you that much... I wouldn't recommend over 800 ISO. You can leave your shutter open as long as you like (well, until you start recording the sky fog/background light). Then you aren't gaining anything by exposing longer because as the stars get more exposure, so does the background. Your histogram should be JUST off the left side. In fact, the higher ISO actually hurts you because you will pick up your skyfog sooner (with a shorter exposure) and you want long exposures to capture meteors while your shutter is open. (Murphy's Law of Meteor photography is that the best meteors will happen while the shutter is closed.)
You don't care if the stars are pinpoint or tracks because the meteors will be long lines that are evident against them. If you ALSO want pinpoint stars, then you need some sort of a tracker (most of them require polar alignment). The most important ingredients are a fast lens and WIDE angle sky coverage. (A corollary to Murphy's Law of Meteor Photography is that, if you shutter is open, the best meteors will happen outside your field of view). This is one reason that the lens I most want to add to my collection is the Samyang/Rokinon 16mm f/2. On Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 5:53 AM, Knarf <[email protected]> wrote: > Cool! > > Cheers, > > frank > > On 12 August, 2015 3:29:01 AM EDT, Larry Colen <[email protected]> wrote: >>I caught one meteor: >>http://www.fluidr.com/photos/ellarsee/sets/72157657118069972/ >> >>Larry Colen wrote: >>> It seems as if the Perseids will be in full swing this week. Does >>anyone >>> have any advice borne of experience for photographing them? >>> >>> I suspect that a lot of short exposures will have the advantage of >>> running at a higher ISO and making it easier to capture a dimmer >>> transient event. Then there is the question of darkfield frames. >>> >>> Astrotracer or not? Optimal focal length? >>> > > -- > Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- Life is too short to put up with bad bokeh. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
