Northern Lights over southern Minnesota

[WWSandMan]

Had some dancing lights visible from the back yard tonight. Not an every-night event around here.

 

[WWChunk]

So damn cool!

[WWDarkdiz]

They are SO much fun to photograph, and then play around with in post processing. I usually use about an 8 second exposure, camera wide open and as wide-angle as possible.  It gets you in the ball park, you can generally adjust what you get to a pretty decent result.

Those are nice pics Sandy

[WWSandMan]

My buddy here in town likes to compete with me using his iPhone 14 Pro ... or whatever the absolute LATEST iPhone is, since that's what he'll have.

And, dammit, he gets some really great shots with a freaking cell phone. 

But I've got him beat with the post-processing. And I can still do things with my camera that he can't... And if I had a truly wide-angle, fast aperture lens, I could really make his cell phone images look ... good. Dammit. But I digress. 

I'm using a Canon EOS R (no numbers, just R ... their first digital mirrorless camera) with one of three lenses: a 50mm f1.8; a 24-70mm f4 and a 100-400 f4.5-5.6. The 24-70 is my best for wide-angle, but I got the far less expensive f4 ... had this been the f2.8 version of that lens, I'd be far happier, if also far more poor. The difference being similar to looking through a short tunnel (f2.8 or lower <for some reason or another, lower aperture numbers == larger light capturing ability, a really good thing for photography> versus looking through a 12" pipe (f4.0)  and versus looking through a straw (f7+).  For really good astro-photography, a really 'fast' wide-angle lens would be the best. 17mm f1.8 would be cool.... 

 

[WWGeezer]

great images Sandy.....and yes I feel the pain on the Iphone stuff.  The images are so good these days, it is kinda hard justifying lugging the big camera around when you travel.  Tending to use mine more on studio work types of projects. .  

[WWDarkdiz]

I think there is a 10-18mm fisheye available, F2.8-3.5 (?). That would be pretty cool too.

I went through my late father's Canon stuff, found a trove of lenses, including a 70-200 f2.8 (all the way through).  You know its a top lens because it is tan coloured, not black. I'll give it a shot this year at the cottage...

[WWSandMan]

On 4/30/2023 at 5:38 PM, WWDarkdiz said:

I think there is a 10-18mm fisheye available, F2.8-3.5 (?). That would be pretty cool too.

I went through my late father's Canon stuff, found a trove of lenses, including a 70-200 f2.8 (all the way through).  You know its a top lens because it is tan coloured, not black. I'll give it a shot this year at the cottage...

Guess I've never really considered a fish-eye, but for hugely wide-angle sky images, it would be great. 

That 70-200 f2.8 is a beautiful lens. Extremely versatile for everything from portraits to landscapes. Lovely bokeh, sharp subjects, fast auto-focus. It's a jewel in any collection.

Most (all?) of Canon's tan/gray lenses are the "L" luxury or Pro Series lenses. Many black ones are L lenses as well, such as the 24-70 F4 I have. All the "L" lenses are distinguished by the narrow red stripe around the lens, and the letter L in the lense description: "EF 24-70 1:4 L USM" for example. I bet that 70-200 in your father's collection has the following on it's info ring: "EF 70-200 1:2.8 L IS (I, II or III) USM" . The red L is as it's stenciled on the lens. 

 

 

[WWSandMan]

Huh... On looking through Canon's list of current EF-mount (pre R mount) L lenses, my own 24-70 f4L is not listed. A little digging, and I find it's been discontinued and is no longer available from Canon new. 

[WWDarkdiz]

Yeah, that’s the one. The lens you have is also very nice, I THINK I have one in the case as well, I’ll have to check