Orion and Sirius rising over the Peloncillo Mountains of southwest New Mexico, on a clear night in December in the early evening. The Belt stars of Orion point down to Sirius, the Dog Star. The long tracked exposures and the filter-modified camera brings out the red nebulsity in the area, such as Barnard’s Loop, the Lambda Orionis bubble at top, the Horsehead Nebula area near the Belt, the very bright Orion Nebula, and the intense Rosette Nebula at left. Airglow add some bands of red and green toward the horizon. This is a mean-combined stack of 5 tracked exposures for the sky, each 2.5 minutes at ISO 1600, and 3 short 30-second but also tracked exposures for the ground at ISO 6400, again mean combined to smooth noise. As the ground exposures were also tracked, the ground is blurred slightly. An additional short exposure taken through a Kenko Softon A filter blended in with Lighten mode adds the star glows for accentuating star colours and the prominence of bright stars. All with the 35mm Canon L-series lens at f/2.5 and Canon 5D MkII camera, on the Star Adventurer Mini tracker, and shot from the Quailway Cottage in SE Arizona.
Twas the night of Christmas 13, and all across the sky, All the stars were twinkling, and Orion shone on high. Orion and the winter stars and constellations above a snowy prairie scene in Alberta, on Christmas night, 2013. This is a stack of 5 x 4 minute exposures with the 14mm Rokinon lens at f/2.8 and Canon 5D MkII at ISO 1600. Images tracked on the iOptron SkyTracker.
The constellation of Orion the hunter, taken Febraury 17, 2012 from home. This is a 4-image stack of 5-minute exposures with the Canon 5D Mark II at ISO 800 and Sigma 50mm lens at f/3.2. Light haze added the natural glows around stars (no filter employed here). Colour correction applied to reduce sky glow gradient at bottom of frame.
