How to take star trail photos like this:
The Camera Setup
Capturing star trails using the stacking method is much more demanding that the standard single exposure method. Mostly on your equipment, but also with the amount of work it takes to get the end result. It is usually worth it in the end though.
You should use the following settings as a guideline to get the best possible star trails:
- Shutter speed: 30 seconds
- You should take short 30 second exposures at regular intervals (with little gap as possible between the shots). It is advised that you a remote shutter release with the trigger locked on, and put the camera on “rapid fire” mode which will allow you to keep shooting without touching the camera for the duration of the shot.
- Aperture: f/5.6
- You will want to use an aperture that doesn’t let too much light in but not too little. Anywhere between f/5.6 and f/8 should be fine.
- ISO: 800
- Probably the most important difference here from the standard “keep the ISO as low as possible”. You will want to choose a relatively higher than normal ISO, this is because the short 30 second exposure still needs to be exposed properly. Adjust all your settings to make sure each and every shot in stack is correctly exposed. If you don’t do this important step, the end result will be dark, and not worth your time.
- Image quality: Large JPG
- This one is optional, but I prefer to shoot in “large jpeg” size when stacking. This makes the process a lot shorter. If you are a raw format shooter, you will find that on longer stacks (100+ shots) the process of batch exporting jpegs for the stacking software will be slow.
Of course, these settings will vary depending on the conditions, these guidelines are written assuming the sky is clear, and there is no haze which means there will be little light polution. If you require any further help on these settings, or if they aren’t working right for you leave a comment below and I will do my best to help you out.
The Software – StarTrails.exe
- Step 1 – Load the files
To open the image selector, click on the button circled above.-
Select the images you want to stack to make a star trail and then click open. This will load the images into the left-hand sidebar. - Step 2 – Get stacking!
- Now you have loaded the files into StarTrails.exe, you should see something that resembles this:
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You are very nearly done, all that’s left is the click the “Star Trails” button, circled below:
Once you’ve clicked this button, you might want to leave the computer alone to do its thing (it’s best to leave it alone, otherwise it’s trying to do a lot at once and will slow your stack down). Go and grap a cuppa, or go and take some more photos! Of course, it’s also quite interesting to watch the software stack, StarTrails.exe will update the image shown on screen as it adds each layer fromt he selected images for stacking. -
When the StarTrails.exe has finished its stacking, you will see the end result on screen. DO NOT close the software at this point and expect it to be saved somewhere, you must save the resulting image yourself!
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To save the image, click the button (circled below). When prompted, save the image to your location of choice.
That’s it! One thing to note is when you save the image from StarTrails.exe the EXIF data is stripped from the resulting image. This is a small annoyance if you upload your photos to sharing sites like flickr and like to share your settings. A possible workaround for this (if you are that bothered) is to take the EXIF data from one of the stack images, and then add it to the stacked image. A bit of a fiddle, but worth it if you need it.
If you need any further help, or clarification of the above please leave me a comment below and I’ll do my best to help you out.
Comments
nice tutorial man. appriciated
IS THERE ANY WAY OF REMOVING IMAGES THAT HAVE BEEN DESTROYED BY AN IDIOT WITH A TORCH FOR EXAMPLE?
Thanks for the comments.
Dan – Yes there is, you have the option of dropping that frame, or editing out that part of the image in order to keep the trails without gaps. Sometimes you can get away with ditching a frame when you are shooting the pole star as movement around this area is minimal.
Oh, and Caps Lock is cruise control for cool
Why is this method more demanding on your equipment?
and what is its advantage over leaving the shutter open for one continuous shot?
It’s more demanding on your equipment simply because you are opening and closing the shutter hundreds of times. Also, usually you will be exposing at a high ISO, which does put a lot more strain(heat) on your camera than normal low ISO shooting. I’ve read in places that long exposures at high ISO can damage sensors and encourage hot pixels, how true this is I don’t know.
Thanks so much for this tutorial and software! I used to love shooting star trails with film but now that I have digital I was trying to decide on a method for accomplishing this. Once I have enough shots of the night sky I’d like to even try combining them into an animation. -Dave
No problems, Dave.
Would be interested to see your results too!
Some nice tutorials here!
Nice tutorial Adam,
I will try this ; so you recommend MANUAL focus or AUTO focus? I guess manual makes more sense
Use autofocus to quickly and easily get your focus point if there is enough light. This can be done by pressing the shutter down half-way with the focus point on the camera positioned on the object you want focussed in the composition. Once auto focus says it has successfuly focussed you should then release the half-pressed button and switch to manual focus. This gives you freedom to re-shoot multiple times without having the re-focus!
Hope this makes sense. It’s late at night
I am hoping to give stack shooting a try this weekend. . .weather permitting!
))
have tried long exposure B4 and yes – have noted the hot sensor & pixel phenom.
I assume no mirror lock-up used, no in camera noise reduction??
I have tripod/cable release, not sure about burst/rapid fire mode though. . .using a canon 350D
Hi,
No mirror lockup used, noise reduction is something I never bother with as I only really do long exposures and it’s not worth loosing a tiny amount of noise and having to wait double the amount of time to see my shot. Of course that is personal preference.
With regards to the rapid fire mode, it’s selected by pressing the top button immediately to the right of the screen. You will see a timer icon next to it, click this until it shows the following icon on the top screen:
http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/8008/86199073.jpg
Hope this helps!
Thanx 4 the speedy reply!
fingers XXXXXXX for good weather. . .;)
oh – any tip on metering mode??
What software do you recommend for Mac?
Hi,
I can’t really say for Mac, however I beleive photoshop can do it!
hi just wondering how you know where to point the camera to get the one star in the middle? And what time of night is it best to start (how long after sunset)?
The one star in the middle will always be the North Star. To find it I usually look for the plough, AKA The Big Dipper:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dipper
If that fails, then I tend to set up a quick high ISO exposure for a few minutes then have a look at the shot, this will tell me where the North Star is because it will be the only one that hasn’t blurred.
Good luck.
nicely explained.. thank you for the tutorial..
http://www.shariblog.com
aaah.. that’s the answer.
can’t wait for tonight.
I have just tried to download this to my windows on mac, and it wont open whereas other windows packages do
any ideas Adam please
thanks
Diana
What’s Windows on Mac? I’m guessing you’re running a virtual machine within OSX or are you literally booting Windows on your Mac?
yes a virtual windows on mac its called VMWare fusion
What is it doing when you try to open it then? Just doing nothing or is it showing any kind of error? I’m no expert but I think perhaps the software just won’t run in a virtual environment.
it wont open up, the file will go across to the false windows screen but when I press “run” it says it failed to open, it says “the application failed to initailise properly”, it has an error number 0xc0000I35
I might be able to do the stacking on an external hard drive maybe (my lap top is out of C drive space you see)
Hi There,
I have always wanted to do the “Star trails” thing, i am a professional Photographer based in Maine. We might have a very clear sky tonight and i live in an area very rural with NO light pollution. My questions using a ALpha A350 with a wide angle lense (18-70mm set at 3.5-5.6) i know its not the PERFECT camera, my biggest question is you describe 30 sec rapid fire, so you want me to focus on something, then im guessing bring the camera out to 18mm for wide shot, then set it at manual focus 30 sec, and jsut keep taking shots, for how long should i do this, how many shots is enough? ISO 800 im guessing
This sounds cool, would you advise a foreground to give the object perspective, such as a rooftop eve, or say a highway (which might be neater considering the cars would be coming
I have a location in mind not far from my house on top if a ridge, but there would be nothing in the foreground, but at high iso and 30 sec shutter it might bring out the mountains in the distance
any advice would be great!
lol forgot to tick the comment box, you can delete this one!
OK i TOOK THE PLUNGE , I have the camera setup on the roof with the eave in the frame, i am taking 30 sec shots on remote release, as soon as one is done another starts, not sure how long the battery will keep up but ill run it until its dead, ill let you know how my results t urn out!
Jay from Maine
Ok i did it, sort of, ran the battery down for the FIRST TIME ever on that camera, the location was boring but it was neat to see it come to life in the software!
http://photos-a.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs390.snc3/23815_105320906163721_100000574373930_136914_6020799_n.jpg
Hi Jay,
Sorry for not replying before, manic busy at the moment, only just managed to blast our the blog post yesterday.
Looks like you got it in the end, that result is amazing. The trails are so smooth. Great job
BTW, love the reflection in the window. Sweet.
Yeah strange, that reflection mystified me and was totally unexpected, i left it on the tripod for 3 hours on the roof,i could here it clicking until the battery went dead, didnt get such the glow you got with yours though, i am THINKING of trying it on a mountaintop in the white mountains tommorrow night, if all goes well that will look MUCH BETTER
thanks for the compliment, i think had i had a better “foreground” it might have impressed me more, plus lol, if 3 hours is all i can get would shortening the shutter to 15 seconds give me more trails, i doubt it, as time would still go by the same.
ideas?
Shortening the shutter speed but going for the same total of 3 hours would make the trails exactly the same, as you said. It would also be a lot darker, I always tend to make sure that each frame is correctly exposed, which usually means at night I’ll bump up to ISO 1600 and a nice wide aperture like f/4.5.
Good luck
Question?
we have partly cloudy skies tonight, can this still be accomplished, last night was rare here, it normally keeps clouding up by night fall in the mountains.
LEt me know so i dont waste my time huh?
I wouldn’t waste the time personally, you could get gaps in the stars. Up to you!
lol yeah ill eyeball it tonight, thanks!
one LAST ?
in your photos you are showing hues, orange, purple, red, how did you shoot those, what was the length on your trails, things like that. I love your work!
Thought for sure the clouds would do me in, guess not, even got a few purple hues in there, not sure where they come from (ISO 1600 this time as you mentioned)
http://photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs390.snc3/23815_105456656150146_100000574373930_137926_4024588_n.jpg
Latest attempt, focused at the pole star this time ,very pleased with this, want more of the pinwheel in the photo next time!
http://photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc3/hs390.snc3/23815_105913282771150_100000574373930_139824_7158306_n.jpg
I posted an album with my luck so far with this, I am noticing strange effects to the top right and left in the shots, not sure where they are coming from, at first I thought this to be light pollution but after shooting in complete darkness i cant say that anymore, Feel free to check out my album and let me know what you think!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11659&id=100000574373930&l=8166babe28
Hi Jay,
Looks like the classic Nikon amp noise! Let me guess Nikon D80 or similar? It’s a problem with that generation of cameras that cannot be fixed.
Sony Alpha A-350
18-70mm F8
This was a really helpful tutorial. I can’t wait to try this out. Thanks a bunch!
latest additions
still cant quite get the “perfect shots” I am going to try on a lake tonight.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11659&id=100000574373930&l=8166babe28
Sony Alpha? I guess they suffer from the same long exposure noise. Have you tried turning noise reduction on? That might cure it, but I don’t know if that camera has the feature.
Those traffic trail shots are tasty, it looks like you live in a pretty nice place too. I am jealous! Severe lack of locations that are near to me here in the UK.
Adam,
thanks for the praise, as for the shots its funny because YOURS at the top of the page are the one i am trying to emmulate, i think YOUR SHOTS are the “tasty” ones
yes i live in a very rural mountainous area, for now, when i move to key west we will have lots of palm tree trails lol!
thanks again, i encourage everyone to post thier shots, lets give adam support for writing such a great tut!
Will try the lake tonight, will report later
Ok, went for the lake shots, turned out great, different variations depending on the traffic across the lake. Check it out.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11659&id=100000574373930&l=8166babe28
I’m new to night photography and getting ready for the august perseids. as a test, i took 4 pictures inside. loaded them into startrails and pressed the startrails icon. the “result” looks just like an individual pic. i expected a brighter result, as if the exposures were added. was i wrong to expect that?
if so, i guess i need to expose each frame fully. maybe i mis-read the startrails.exe description.
thanks for any help…frank
Las fotos que tome, deben ser sacadas en formato raw o jpg para realizar el trazo??
Is there a version for a MAC?
frank-in-toronto, you need more than 4 shots!, try about half an hour of repeat 30 second exposures to get the feel of what the Startrails program can do.
I thought 4 as a test would show something. Anyway, that night my equipment “dewed” up so my shoot was almost over before it started. I’ll be doing the half-hour of 30 second shots when I can. thanks.
is it possible to add darkframe?
Just got the camera shooting now, will leave for half hour, otherwise someone might get annoyed at the 30sec clicking. I’ve done a few long exposure shots 25 mins plus, I’m hoping the stacking will reduce noise.
I love startrails.exe. I am teaching star trails classes at my photo club. Problem is that some of these folks use Macs and startrails.exe doesn’t work on the PC. Why not have a version that would work on the Mac?
Sorry I meant “doesn’t work on the Mac”.
A Mac software to create star trail images is available at: http://www.starstax.net
Heyy
Thank you very much for the detailed and perfect tutorial..you did nice job…
will try startrail photography in Mumbai, India…
will defo update you..btw i m in ur flickr a/c…
Chirag Limbachiya
Hey, I’m excited about the program, but can’t get it to run in English. When prompted, I selected English, clicked ‘okay’, and it immediately booted in German. I tried changing the language under the ‘Sprache’ menu, which told me to reboot. I did, no success. So I deleted the program, downloaded it again, and same problem. I’m running Windows 7. Is anyone else having this problem?
Thanks in advance-
Josh
I’m having the same problem as Josh S. I selected English to download and now can’t get the program to run in English. I’m running Windows XP. Any suggestions?
Went out last night to catch some star trails during the Persied meteor shower. Want to see what I captured, so hoping for some suggestions on how to fix this program problem. Thanks in advance for all suggestions.
Try this: http://www.markus-enzweiler.de/software/software.html
I realized I selected the ‘Open’ option when prompted for the download and it simply ran once. That didn’t give me the option to open it in English. When I saved the file to my computer and installed it, then I had the option to open in English every time I ran the program.
bloody good shoots, have been doing some trails myself using the nikon D5000 it has an interval timer mode which takes out a lot of hassle
I haven’t used startrails much as I found another program called starstax which works quite well bud does not have the video mode on
Not sure how to set up my Nikon D300 for rapid fire mode; can you help me?
[...] are many many programs you can use, one is ImageStacker: Image Stacker You can read another here: How To: Star trails – Stacking with StarTrails.exe That last one has a link to another star trails program from this site: http://www.Startrails.de-Home [...]
Hello,
It’s cool tutorials. I have Canon 5D MK2 so How do I set AF continuing rapid fire for 30s automatic ? Please give me some help. Thanks
5D MkII, you need to use a cable shutter release and lock it down. set the camera to fapid fire, In Manual mode set the shutter speed to 30 seconds.
the key is the cable release, holds the shutter button down for as long as you wish
have fun!
Susie, You can find good cable shutter release options on Ebay a lot cheaper than purchasing from a camera store. I found one for my Canon for less than $5 U.S. recommended from a friend and it has been fantastic. I use it for star trails as well as any other long exposure photos such as light painting. Have fun!!!
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