Before travel to Yachats on the central Oregon coast my intuition was that I could compose a photo with the milky way aligned with surf by Devil’s Churn. Photopills confirmed this, and that 9-10 p.m. would be fine, so a late night could be avoided. This image was captured August 30th at 9:30 from the USFS view point atop Cape Perpetua.
I had scouted this spot previously, only as a tourist, viewing from this scenic overlook during daytime. Thus I did not know that smack dead center in the forest the bright lights of a visitor center would grossly wreck the night picture. See the import which I added below. Processing to heal over those lights and to adjust down the lights at the city of Florence on the horizon, and of ships at sea, kept me busy for a week. Also the auto headlights lower R, on the road into the campground.
Specific Feedback Requested
Is the contrast in the sky over done? I’ve found that many view images on low resolution devices and on over compressed webpages, so I tend to err on the side of higher contrast and texture for astros.
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
Sony a7iii (24mp, large pixels for minimal high ISO noise, deep shadow recovery) + Laowa 15mm Zero-D, f/2.0 30" ISO=3200, exposed to the right while hoping not to blow highlights yet be able to recover details in the shadowed land mass and surf.
Processed with Topaz DeNoise AI then LrC. Spot healing tool in Ps used extensively on the intruding lights. The LrC sensor dust tool worked well to heal numerous hot pixels in the recovered shadow, seen when magnified.
Tree branch intruding upper R is to my liking, filling dead space and balancing the land mass lower L. But when I darkened the sky (using the LrC luminosity mask in a grad filter) contrast of the branch to the sky was lost. Next I used a radial filter and the luminosity mask to gently recover some sky luminance surrounding the branch.
I think you’ve got a winner here, sir. Thanks for sharing all the post work, and the initial import to see how it changed. (This would make a great before & after post in the learning section).
I am impressed with how well it turned out, a tribute to your post processing work. I’m no expert on astro photography (suck at it actually), but the sky looks fine to me, maybe just a bit too dark in both upper corners, but not by much. Nice work eliminating the visitors center. I also like the lighting on the beach and waters in the foreground. Adds a nice balance to the sky.
I’ve been to Cape Perpetua and the Devil’s Churn many times. I know almost exactly where you were and I think you captured it quite well. Congratulations.
I’ll look into the learning section which I’ve yet to explore. Since this image is posted in landscape critiques, can it be used in the learning section without first deleting the critique post, which I’m not sure I’d do until some time has elapsed.
Wonderful capture and an excellent “salvage job!” I think I’d love to see more of the original crop on top – it feels a bit cut off in the final version, but the original lets the Milky Way fade out a bit at the top. I love the tree, too.
For my taste, the sky portion is a just bit too contrasty, but not by a lot. One thing that I have discovered with scenes like this is to reduce the smaller stars with a touch of negative Clarity and bringing the Sharpness slider (in LR/ACR) down to 0. The lens correction slider can help a bit with the dark corners but that’s just the way the sky always seems to darken in MW shots. Sometimes a bit of lightening with gradients helps, but possibly you did that.
I’d also be interested in your processing. The MW is a challenge. It looks like that lens is good with corner aberrations. Stars are a real challenge.
Diane, thank you, just the coaching I want. Will play with your suggestions, decreasing sharpness/clarity over sky outside the MW. I had not thought of that.
The Venus Optics Laowa f2 15mm Zero-D is a gem. It focuses to <6" so besides being my usual astro lens it’s also capable of producing incredible wildflower close ups while including the surrounding background. Unlike complex f2.8 zooms with lots of elements this prime has a t-stop matching its fast f-stop. You get to use lower ISO for the same aperture and shutter speed. Its straight blades make precise aperture stars. I have the original Sony FE and it’s now available for Nikon Z and Canon EF. I get many keepers with it, from 6" to thousands of lightyears away. Doesn’t take a lot of room in the camera bag. Also its price has only 3 digits.
Diane, I used the dodge/burn LrC tool with a Wacom tablet to adjust the sky outside the MW. Texture and whites were reduced, and slight Dehaze added. I like the results. Thank you!
I like the top image a lot. I think the glow on the surf is much nicer then the other lights in the bottom image. The tree branch sticking in from the right top does bother me a little. I just seems like something hanging out in space. It took me a minute to figure out what it was.
