Easy Milky Way Processing For Beginners in Lightroom | Milky Way Photography | Astrophotography 

That is really good to here! I was definitely worried the video might be too quick or that I would assume too much of my audience's understanding and blow by too many people too quickly. Since this was YOUR image, I at least wanted this to be a great resource for you. Thanks for the inspiration to complete this video! :D -Aaron

It was a nice set of photos Andrew. Any chance your remember your camera and lens settings? Thanks!

@JPageRocks looking in Lightroom @1:12 it's taken at iso 5000, 28mm, f/2.8 with 20sec expo but i didn't spot de body (crop or full?). edit: it's a Nikon D750

Matthieu, thanks for helping JPageRocks get that info! This comment slipped by me somehow! :D As for his lens, he was using a Tamron 28-75mm f2.8 using it at its widest 28mm. Thanks for watching guys! Sorry for the delay in chiming in here! :D -Aaron

Do you remember where in AZ this was or the mountain?

I agree, he was talking about making subtle change after subtle change, and then applies this drastic blue/yellow color filter.

Ah right on! That feels really good to hear! :D Thanks, Rexx! -Aaron

Thank you, Phil! You are completely right. It IS all subjective and there are many ways to do this. I am glad that this beginner version resonates well even today. The changes to lightroom beg me to make an update but the biggest changes are just that you wouldn't turn down the highlight slider like that anymore. Mostly it is all still true. But I should do an updated one. It's just hard to make it worth while when it would be nearly identical. :D Thanks again for your comment and thanks for watching my channel! -Aaron

Man, thank you! I am really glad it has helped you and hope you enjoy some of my tutorials coming out in the future! :D -Aaron

Hey thanks, Charles! It was fun to do and I have many pending videos. Some recorded, some waiting to be RE-recorded to make them tighter and quicker to watch and then some just in the queue to create. So I hope you like them too! Thanks again for watching! :D -Aaron

Did I miss something? He didn't completely show how you did dodging and burning? I saw him create 3 masks for dark areas, bright, and light pollution, but he never showed what edits you did in them to make it pop. Can someone explain?

Thanks, Kirk! :D I am really glad it was still fun even though it wasn't the Valley of Fire video yet. That is coming tomorrow morning most likely but we will see if I can finish that tonight. :D Appreciate you sticking around with us, Kirk! -Aaron

Thank you, Marina! I am really jealous of you getting to go to the Atacama Desert! That has the best skies of anywhere on this earth! Low on moisture in the air, high elevation above the heat and other factors that cause atmosphere pollutant and light pollution and so the place is amazing to view the night sky from! PLUS you get to see the FULL Milky Way Core unlike how it appears to us here in the Northern Hemisphere. YES we can see the whole core but it is all along the horizon mostly and it would be amazing to see it HIGH in the sky at the zenith when it is most clear! :D Thanks for loving the video! I am excited for you to learn more too! Please keep me posted and never be afraid to ask questions! You can find me here or on our Facebook listeners group just search for Photog Adventures! :D -Aaron

You are welcome, Tom! I am really glad that you are still using it multiple times! :D -Aaron

+Luuk Dingemanse Thanks, Luuk! People were asking how we processed our images, so I started with how I process mine and it was a good way to introduce Astro Photog, our Astrophotography focused sub-channel. 😃 We plan to add more of these in the future. Some as our Friday video and some as bonus videos throughout the week! Thanks again for the kind words and look forward to four more videos this weekend! -Aaron

Did I miss something? He didn't completely show how you did dodging and burning? I saw him create 3 masks for dark areas, bright, and light pollution, but he never showed what edits you did in them to make it pop. Can someone explain?

Thanks, Drew! Always appreciate your support and feedback! Thanks for watching! 😃 -Aaron

Photog Adventures : Great job! How long in between shots so stitching would be good? Where in AZ were u ? Super job in Lt Rm on the processing. Very easy to follow!

Hey thank you, John! Those are very kind words. I am really glad you feel that way. I was hoping it would come off well, but I didn't expect that. Thanks for the confidence to keep it up! :D -Aaron

Cool! I say this every time but I am glad it helped. 😃 I am glad there was something in it to learn from that made it worth watching, especially since it was a long video. Thanks, Tim! -Aaron

That is awesomely nice of you to say! Thanks so much! I really appreciate the ego boost that what I am doing is working and love that you found the channel! Keep coming back and let me know when you ever have any questions! Good luck with this next Milky Way season! 😃 -Aaron

Thanks, MrSharkPhoto! :D Sorry the reply delay. We have been out in North Carolina and it put me behind with a lot of stuff and I let our RU-vid Comments pile up a little. :) -Aaron

Yeah exactly! :D I know that I love it more blue and to do more to it than the natural look but I am also an Astronomer who loves space and the science of it all. So I have that conscience who needs to give the disclaimer so that I am not among those perpetuating the wrong idea. Many almost most people grow to adulthood not seeing the Milky Way with their own eyes and then when they do they are not sure they are seeing it because they have the wrong idea of it. So I like to make that clear when I have a platform like this. Thanks Bryan for noticing that and thanks for watching our video! :D -Aaron (Sorry for the delay in responding, we had a busy production last night live with our Patreon Patrons and then today has been busy! :D )

Oh yeah? Awesome! I am really happy to hear that! There are many approaches to Milky Way post-processing and I wanted to feature one that is straight forward and easy for all to repeat. I am stoked it helped you out! Thanks for watching, bamdap! 😃 -Aaron

Thanks, Reedsy! You will love it. Lightroom is the perfect start to any image. Getting the RAW file back to an image of contrast and proper color is perfect in Lightroom and then I use photoshop for any cleanup or layer work I need. Especially if I have images I need to combine. -Aaron

Thank you, Kusan! I will definitely keep it up! Glad that you found the video! 😃 -Aaron

Wow, thank you, astrojourneyuk! It’s awesome to hear how well this simple method to using Lightroom still stands as useful after all these years! I really appreciate you letting me know! Thanks for watching my video and hope you will make a home here and keep coming back for more! Let me know how your next image edits turn out when you use this method! 😃 -Aaron

@@PhotogAdventures will do!

Hey thanks, Ross! Th

Haha my 1-year old daughter hit send. I was saying, That's nice of you to say, man. Hope I can keep it up. Getting another computer on Tuesday that will make it possible for me to edit videos again and upload stuff. So I am going to get back to pumping content out. Hope I can get that same teaching style in the next ones. Seriously, thank for watching and commenting! Hope you enjoy our future videos too! -Aaron

Haha! That is awesome, Brad! I am really stoked you found immediate improvements following it! You will find that there are even more ways to make your processing even better with stacking images. I am working on that myself right now and hope to have a couple videos out about it in the next month! Thanks for watching and Subscribing! Let me know if you ever have any questions. 😃 -Aaron

That is EXACTLY RIGHT! Like any good image, Milky Way especially, survives best when you expose correctly and have good data to work from. Harder to keep noise down if you are rescuing under exposed images in post. Thanks for watching, Rod! 😃 -Aaron

Wow thank you, Eric for the kind words!! I love to do it and I have been on an extended hiatus the last year and a half and I am coming back! I am really happy to be back doing something I love! 😃 -Aaron

Haha thanks for the compliment, Nilotpal! Really glad you enjoyed it that much! 😃 Hope you keep coming back for more as we keep getting tutorials out in 2019! -Aaron

Hey thanks, Jack! 😃 It is extremely satisfying hearing people say that. I love teaching this stuff and it is nice when I get to hear about someone enjoying and learning from my videos! Thanks for watching, Jack! Good luck putting it into practice and let me know if you ever have any questions! -Aaron

Awesome! I am really glad to hear the video helped. Like others have said. there are things you should do everytime and some things you can avoid doing like the bi-color filter but sometimes that filter is just awesome to add and the image is lacking without it. I want to do a video JUST on the pictures we have used the Bi-color filter to better them with. Thanks for watching, Michael! I hope you keep coming back for more! :D -Aaron

Awesome, where is your road trip going to be? -Aaron

We've planned it to be through the whole month of July.

Nice! July is a great month for the Milky Way because within the same night you get two types of Milky Way shots. A slanted almost 45-degree angle Milky Way early in the night and then almost vertical by early morning hours! Hope we get to see the images that come from it! :D -Aaron

+dana p Haha Dana! That is a huge compliment! That you could listen to those podcasts over and over! It just means that Brendon and I didn't get in Ian and Royce's way. 😄 And man, I completely agree with you! As I got to that stage once I applied the Pro Contrast filter, I seriously debated on stopping. But this wasn't an image of mine, it was a tutorial on how we processed that image with Andrew back in Phoenix. Back in Phoenix we really liked it with the bi-color filter and so I was showing how we did all that. I still love it with the filter, but in the side by side comparison while I was adding it, I did wonder if I liked it more without. But like you said, there isn't a wrong way to do it, unless you are claiming it is an 100% accurate representation of the actual night sky. When you do that you do have to process it precisely in a way that is only natural colors. Thanks for your comments, I think it is an extra help to others watching this to know that they can stop following the tutorial at any point and make the changes I emphasized throughout the video that people can make based on their personal preferences or goals with the image. The bottom line is that it is fun, and following these steps anyone can do it today without feeling intimidated by the overwhelming feeling of bringing your RAW to a nicely processed final! 😃 Thanks again and hope you like our future videos too! -Aaron

Oh nice! You have been out to Picket Post Mountain before eh? Yeah Andrew Block got an AWESOME shot here. It was quite a morning for really only having 40-50mins of true dark between moon set and Astronomical Twilight. Thanks for watching the video, NomadicLensPhotos! :D -Aaron

Yes I drive through superior to work! I stopped there a few weeks ago and got some Milky Way shots at the windmill near the picketpost trailhead on the way to work at 3am. It's a great spot close to the valley that has a good view of the Milky Way.

The original idea was to have the Windmill in the shots but it was further back from the parking spot where we met everyone and the Cacti there were dang awesome so there wasn't a need to move to the Windmill. But I still need to get my own shot here and I think I will get the Windmill in there too. -Aaron

Photog Adventures the shot you got is great too! Keep up the great work!

Thanks man! Appreciate it and good luck with your new channel. Looks like you are starting up and chronicling your adventures in Travel Photography. Right on! :D -Aaron

Awesome! Glad you liked it! Thanks, Westporter! 😃-Aaron

Oh wow! That is really high praise! Thanks, Joseph! :D I have so much planned to get out for Astro Photog over June that has been met with delay after delay the past two months. I sure hope you like them as much. Well, at least half as much! :D Thanks for watching and subbing, Joseph! Hoping to keep you enjoying the Astro Photog videos! -Aaron

Photog Adventures yessir amd in fact just finalized an edit using these guidelines that came out just a touch nicer than my usual astro shots! I never even knew about Color Efex Pro until I watched this video. If you have instagram you can see that image under my profile at "internetexpedition" and compare to my second most recent which was definitely too magenta.

Oh right on! I just checked it out and yeah it does look really nice. Sometimes keeping a false color in there is a great atmosphere for the art of the image. It doesn't always have to be a purist representation of the sky, I can see both as great images. But yeah, color efex pro and using the Pro Contrast "Correct Color Cast" feature is amazing! I use that in every image practically. Sometimes I don't even recognize that I HAVE a color cast until I pop that on there and see the difference. :D Awesome, pic man and thanks for sharing! Definitely going to keep an eye on your instagram going forward. :D -Aaron

Same to you friend! Look forward to checking out more videos.

Thanks man! I always get way stoked when people say they are looking forward to them! I am optimistic about my chances this week to get a few out. Stay tuned! -Aaron

Man, Angelo, wow big thank you for your kind words and for taking the time to let me know! It is really awesome to hear that I was able to match your style and that this will be helpful to you in your Milky Way Photography. I am always flattered to hear someone enjoyed the video, but this is extremely flattering that you found it to be the best you have seen with all the great options out there! Please let me know how it goes when you try going over some of your older images and if anything comes up where I can help you out please give me a message! I am happy to help any way I can! Good luck and thanks again! :D -Aaron

your welcome mate. Very much deserved.

Thanks! :D -Aaron

You bet, J! Thanks for watching it! :D -Aaron

Hey thank you, Natasha! We are so stoked that FStoppers shared this video so that more great people like you can actually know we exist! 😄 Really appreciate the kind words! I am fighting an illness to start 2018 but when I have my health back I have a plan to put out many Milky Way Photography videos over the next few weeks and I hope you check those out and enjoy those too! 😃 Thanks for watching and especially thank you for letting me know you liked it! -Aaron

Aww, get well soon. I'll be watching out for you! I'm looking at getting a new toy (iOptron SkyGuider Pro EQ Camera Mount, or Goto version) So any tips on this sort of thing would be awesome!

This is a huge request lately, my buddy Eric Benedetti is the expert I trust the most on this topic and I will get on that request with him ASAP! Thanks for the well wishes. I got worse the last two days but I am optimistic the worst is behind me 😬 Hopefully! -Aaron

Haha that is awesome to hear, luke! If you are up here in the northern hemisphere like me than we have a few months to wait but I will have loads of videos up by then to help us all get out there on the right foot for Milky Way season 2018! 😃 Appreciate you messaging and saying thanks for the video! Hope you keep coming back! -Aaron

Awesome! Luckily this just means that I have a few months to practice! Seriously, thanks again, fantastic content.

luke fellers haha great attitude! I should adopt it...I am still feeling withdrawals! 😄 Thanks again and when you do get out there make sure you come back and let me know how it went and if your picture turns out! 😃 -Aaron

Will do, thanks Aaron!

Sweet! Can’t wait to hear about it. 👍🏼

Thanks, Vaun! You can get away with JUST Lightroom. You don't need to do the Color Efex Pro part or the content-aware fill. You can just crop your image. That said, buying Photoshop and Lightroom CC is the same package at $10 a month so why not! :D -Aaron

A short loop can be a complementary effect but unfortunately I am no longer in that studio space after a divorce and my new setup is kinda ... okay but not great. Would really like your opinion because I am really wanting to make it better but right now it is just a simple two light setup where any short-loop or even rembrandt lighting would be welcome but I can't pull it off yet with these lights. Not enough shadow to get that nice triangle on my opposite cheek. Look up some of my more recent videos from the Milky Way Wednesdays where I look STRAIGHT into the camera. What do you think I can do there, Johnny? -Aaron

That's huge praise! Thanks, Michael! The best thing about Andrew's shot was that he learned just a couple tips about exposing his Milky Way properly and then took an awesome first shot! Thanks for watching, Michael! -Aaron

JUst like Arron did for the images, you can find an image that suits your creative view and change that image. Just remember that once the changes have been made, you need to highlight it and then select ALL the images in the time -lapse then sync them to that initial image. I have done this and it worked out well. Bill

Thanks, Zak! Honestly, the only edit you NEED to make before stitching the Pano together in Lightroom is to do the Lens Correction with the lens profile. Apply that to each image and you are good. The rest of my edits I made were just personal preference. Doing the white balance and slider edits can happen easily after the stitch. Thanks for watching, Zak! -Aaron

Photog Adventures oh totally makes sense. Thank you.

you have to select the image you have processed, then you have to shift or control on pc to select the one(s) you want to sync. then the button should be lit up. hit sync and the menu should pop up hit okay and then wait for it to process

Henry good idea! You gave me an awesome video I can create for my 14-days of new videos leading up to the launch of my Milky Way Course on Feb. 2nd! I will do that either tomorrow or Monday and emphasize my techniques for dodging and burning the Milky Way! Thanks for the great idea! 😃 -Aaron

Hey thanks, Liam! Appreciate you watching and stoked you liked it! :D -Aaron

no worries :) and now cause of the video i have found out how to do a panorama in lightroom

Haha nice! And that was just a sidenote in the lesson! 😄 -Aaron

Alistair Hamill Photography Great question! I did not address noise reduction in this video but we have a nice system that Brendon taught me recently that is good and subtle but makes a big difference. I have been wanting to make a video on that and I should make it this week to answer your question. In short, you can find it in my live webinar replay about Noise Reduction. Let me get you a time stamp and link here shortly. Thanks for watching! 😃 -Aaron

Photog Adventures Thanks very much, Aaron! I appreciate the speedy reply too! I've already picked up a number of tips from your video, and anything more would be a real bonus!

Absolutely! I have been off my reply game over the holidays and rushing on my Milky Way Course production which is just about done so I usually answer as fast as I can and was glad to see your message today and be back to my old self! 😄 So here is the link: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-EXEmg-DXkuw.html go to 16:30 in that video and you will hear the beginning of Brendon showing me for the first time how he has been using Lightroom noise reduction with some good success. I hadn’t bothered with noise reduction before because I have been keeping my stuff simple. But he converted me that day and you guys see it all live during that webinar. 😃 -Aaron

I disagree. Those terms go back to film days, where you shine light through a negative onto light sensitive paper. The more light, the darker the image. So burning added more light to a portion of the image, darkening it. Dodging held light back from parts of the image, lightening that area.

Haha no you are completely right. I feel that way too. Every time I see it in the video I was thinking it... :D But like I said below, the whole tutorial was derived from an actual edit session I did with Andrew Block and we had the Bi-Color filter on it then. I was using this as an opportunity for him to see exactly what we did that night in a way that he could return to and reference. But it is funny, I really loved his image with the bi-color filter when we did it two weeks ago, but I tried 5 different times to make the bi-color filter great again, even when I matched it precisely I still found myself wondering if I should ditch it. I wondered if maybe the difference was just my monitor and it would look fine for others, but I think the consensus so far is that it was too much. I decided to own it for the video but I completely agree with anyone who decides to stop at the Pro Contrast. I would almost recommend it depending on the image. My tall vertical image I shared in the end there, now THAT is an image that HUGELY benefited from the Bi-color filter. So sometimes it is almost necessary and sometimes it goes a bit too far. Thanks for the comments! I really love it when I see people coming back for more every week! We are honored to have you guys following our adventures! -Aaron

Oh and about the image, there were two images missing from the original panorama stitch. It actually was wider but I must have missed those images when grabbing them off Andrew's computer with my thumb drive. Because it was more wide originally. Again, I taught it the way I did to match the original, which in hindsight isn't the best. But this won't be my last processing tutorial. I like the idea of doing some different images roughly the same to show how it changes image to image and can be useful to adjust according to the image itself.

Thanks for thinking this is awesome! Glad you liked it! Hope you will come back again and see our other videos, Jasem! :D -Aaron

+Hazem Telib Oh nice! Awesome!! Thanks, Hazem! We really appreciate you subscribing and showing your support! We absolutely respect and appreciate anyone who takes the time to follow our adventures. We are out right now at Escalante and all we can think about is how fun it will be to share the video of this trip! 😃 We capture a cool shot and then we both go "RU-vid is going to love this shot." Our gear is entirely detailed in the description of almost all of our videos so if you are wanting more check that out. But we both shoot Canon. I have a 6D and Brendon has a 5Dmark3. We both want to get a mark4 someday soon. Thanks again for watching and hope you love our future videos! -Aaron

+Willnot Betracked haha! Congrats on the coming changes and really glad you enjoyed the tutorial video! 😃 -Aaron

flic.kr/p/V6bDdB

You are welcome! I completely hear your struggles. Sometimes the foreground only really can turn out if you captured a good exposure of the foreground. Sometimes you are in such a dark situation that it requires a separate capture JUST for the foreground. Which means a longer exposure to really bring it out. I am going to check out your image now and see what I think! :D Thanks for all your kind words and you are welcome for Color Efex Pro. The only sad thing is that since this video came out, Adobe officially declared it would not update the Nik Collection - that includes Color Efex Pro - ever again. This means if the Nik Collection ever breaks because of an update to Photoshop or Lightroom, its working days are over. Which is very sad. I love Nik Collection... :( Okay checking out your image! -Aaron

Okay that is an awesome shot of the Milky Way but it appears you DEFINITELY have the issue I was referring to where you just didn't capture any data about the foreground in your exposure. The image isn't bad at all, but if you want to see more foreground you are going to have to go back and capture it again with a higher ISO to help you see more of the foreground. OR take your shot for the Milky Way and then take a shot for the foreground. I would even go to 3200 ISO or higher for your Milky Way shot and then I would capture a lower ISO but LONG exposure. Something like 1minute or longer using Bulb Mode to really bring out the foreground. When you see images with clear foregrounds they are taken with any one of these options: 1- Captured earlier in the evening before it got dark and then composited in with the later shot of the Milky Way. 2- Long Exposure taken of the foreground to really bring it out and then sometimes multiples taken (around 20) and then STACKED to fix the noise. 3- Captured with the moon up and illuminating the foreground. 4- Captured with light pollution lighting the scenery. 5- Light painted so you can see the foreground. I think that sums up all the options of making the foreground visible. I might have forgotten one or two methods but those are all the ones I use at different times. -Aaron

Thank you for your prompt response and feedback! Ok I will definitely try that for my next trip in a few weeks. I haven't figured out how to do bulb for my camera lol It's the Sony A7s ii :) We are going to Mike's Sky Ranch in a few weeks which is completely dark skies ...very excited. Thanks again Aaron!

Of course, Catherine! Any time! Awesome! That place sounds sweet, might work out great! As for Sony A7s ii, I haven't used it myself but maybe there is an easy option built into camera to do long exposures or maybe you will need to buy an intervalometer. With an intervalometer you can set it to expose for many minutes. As long as you need. Good luck with it and let us know how it goes! -Aaron

Btw, love the video! I am going to check out more of your videos as I would like to learn to make my foreground more interesting than a black foreground!

+Parshati Patel Hahaha I was worried no one would recognize it because I never stood up and showed the whole shirt. I am glad you did! Love that shirt. 😄 Bought it straight from SpaceX! About foregrounds, they really are key to making your Milky Way images pop! I will have to make a video soon talking about good and bad foregrounds and show some of my failed Milky Way shots. 😃 -Aaron

I am a lover of space themed clothing hence my eyes are very sharp for such tshirt :P I would love to see some videos about how to light up the foreground properly. I have tried using flashlight and cellphone screen light but I always get patches of light and it kills the picture :( I am also new to Photoshop so do not really have grasp on how to clean them up (in terms of foreground). If you could do a video on that, it would be awesome! Thanks!

Haha then you get me then! I need more space themed stuff! :D Yeah, that sounds awesome! I will make a video about both. The only bad news, is that the BEST way to light up your foreground is going to cost you. But I will make a video showing all types from Hi-CRI flashlights, HI-CRI LED light panels to the humble headlamp or cell phone light. I will show in the video how the light affects the image differently and help show what can be done in photoshop or lightroom if you have an image lit by the poorer light sources. It will be a few weeks though before the skies are good for the Milky Way again because of the moon, but I will get it out asap! :D -Aaron

Ahhh!! I knew I would have to spend more money but hey I got 14mm last year so I can buy light this year 😝 look forward to the video about foreground :)

Heya Mark! Glad to have you find the video and participate by commenting! :D You are absolutely right! Going the extra step of taking more images, doing stacking and maybe even getting a different exposure for the foreground to bring out the terrain and possibly stacking that as well would create a MUCH BETTER image for print! I completely agree with Mark about getting into Starry Landscape Stacker or Sequator for those of you ready to add some more steps to your Milky Way Photography. . I should also mention again that this image I processed was from a Milky Way First timer so it came out amazingly well for a first image of the Milky Way ever! Also, my own disclaimer is that I added a step here with NIK collection that I wouldn't do now but enjoyed doing back then and included it as an "option". I am afraid it might not come off as an "optional" step to some people coming to this video hoping to find a workflow to copy step by step. I think after three years it is DEFINITELY time to do a new version of this video to offer a non-nik filtered version so that people don't get the idea that nik collection is needed at all. Thanks for watching the video, Mark! Hope you stick around and comment on others! Stoked to have crossed your path finally. :D -Aaron

Aaron King Thanks man. I know we make these videos and then everything changes and we forget that people watch them and we are sometimes even appalled at what we used to teach! :-) I am a total post-processing nerd so I spend thousands of hours watching everybody trying to see if I can find good and useful information to push further. One of the most important things about starry landscape stacker is turning off the sharpening and the noise and using batches of two, four, eight, 16, 32, 64, or 128 images. I’ve been told that it throws out anything in between those numbers.

Ahhh yeah, that isn't covered here in this video but I do cover how to know that info here in this video about using PhotoPills for the Milky Way: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-nXk-2BrxySw.html That said, the answer to your questions depends on your location and the month of the year. If you are in the Northern Hemisphere, you are going to find the Core of the Milky Way pretty much directly SOUTH in June and July. It starts out East-SouthEast in the spring and then moves South and then to the SouthWest - West by the end of the year. I have more videos coming out with answers to these questions this weekend. So stay tuned for more and thanks for watching, Hinaio! Really appreciate it! :D -Aaron

thanks for the advice, before I had to point in all directions and check which direction and it WAS southwest and I was shooting in june, Thanks a lot!

Right on! I am glad you found it and hope your shot turned out awesome! :D -Aaron

Heya Kyle! Yeah that picture was captured by Andrew using his Nikon D750. Thanks for watching! 😃 -Aaron

This was in the evening just after the moon set, probably around 10:30pm

Haha hey hey Sue! :D LOL Yes....definitely spoiled now! A Milky Way outing without huckleberry ice cream with a marion berry crumble just isn't the same! :D hahaha That is really cool to hear that it was actually the highlight of such an awesome trip! I am finishing up the podcast about our Crater Lake trip right now and just about to mention you guys! As for your white balance, the step in the video is to start off at a neutral white balance and then adjust as you need depending on the colors in the sky you want to highlight and bring out or the colors you want to tone down. For instance you might have too much magenta in the end and you bring the tone down to the green side to fight the magenta. I am looking forward to seeing your work at the dropbox folder! I hope that your panorama stitched well with Lightroom. I actually only YESTERDAY had a chance to really work on my Crater Lake images and I had issues stitching my panorama as I was trying to include too many extremes in my area covered. It was less a 180 degree scene and more of a 230-250 degree area and I didn't capture a high enough TOP level of the scene to allow the Milky Way arch to not get stretched. But that was from the night before. That night with you we were out earlier when the Milky Way was lower in the sky and so I am really hoping your pano turned out far easier on Lightroom than mine did! :D Checking it out now! -Aaron

Hey Sue, I just discovered an error on my part due to my website updates I am working on right now. The email info@photogadventures.com stopped working! So thank you for using it so I could realize what I had done and fix it. (I wonder how many emails I had missed....oops) Can you resend the dropbox link now? I will be able to get it this time. :D -Aaron

+Sue Decker sure! What email did you send the link to? We will for sure have our final pictures on our video when it comes out. I'm the mean time you can follow us on Facebook and Instagram. We are so glad you had a good time up there! It was a highlife for us too! :)

Hey Alyce! It is always labeled as Dehaze and is there at the very bottom. You might not have Lightroom CC but have Lightroom 5 or 6. If you actually DO have Lightroom CC, make sure you have updated recently. Check your Lightroom version by watching as it loads. It will say under the title "Adobe Creative Cloud Photoshop Lightroom CC" in the blue box that shows while loading. Mine currently is 2015.8 Release and I have an update pending when I am ready. (I wait when I have a project going on) So double check which version of Lightroom you have. Because if you have CC and have updated it anytime since 2015 you will have Dehaze. Now if you actually have Lightroom 5 or 6, you can add Dehaze through this method: fstoppers.com/hacks/how-get-new-dehaze-tool-lightroom-6-79840

thank you! i updated it .. and it's there now :) and WOW this dehaze option is a MUST for milky ways !!

Oh nice! I am glad it was easy to resolve! :D Yeah the dehaze option is pretty amazing. The video I am working on today has some clouds that look great with the dehaze slider up a little. Oh and for the Yosemite video I couldn't even SEE the rock wall because of some clouds and with Dehaze up +100 you could see right through the clouds! It was amazing! :D --Aaron

Oh yeah, that part is the most confusing so no worries! It is my fault. Like you said, I applied the brush to the image using the adjustment brush tool in Lightroom and then I make adjustments to the settings of the adjustment brush to make it either a BURN=DARKER or DODGE=BRIGHTER. In the case of the BURNING that I applied, I painted adjustment brush strokes all over the darker parts of the Milky Way and then moved the EXPOSURE slider to the left making everything under the brush strokes darker. I also do the same thing for the dodging where I paint strokes all over the BRIGHT parts of the Milky Way and then for THAT brush the slider for Exposure is moved to the RIGHT making everything under the brush strokes LIGHTER. As for the work on the light pollution, I painted brush strokes on a THIRD adjustment brush all over the area where the light yellow color is and then adjusted the slider for WHITE BALANCE making the yellow more blue. I am sorry for the confusion, the problem is that I had scrolled down on the RIGHT PANEL to have access to the change the brush feather and flow and so the information of what changes between the different Adjustment brush pins gets completely lost and hidden! It is something I noticed a long time ago and decided I better do an entire video dedicated to dodging and burning the Milky Way so people can understand that part of the process better. Sorry it got hidden by the scroll! Let me know if that makes any sense. :D -Aaron

Wow, can't believe you wrote such a long, detailed response to my question... Thank you Aaron!!! You're absolutely the best & the effect of Color Fex is just amazing, firs time use thanks to your introduction and already in love. Can't wait for your next vid!

Haha hey thanks for saying that, Allen! You are absolutely welcome and free to ask stuff anytime! Brendon and I are easily found through social media under Photog Adventures so hope to hear from you again! :D -Aaron

Thanks again for the reply Aaron! I do have another question for editing Milky Way tho: I saw many Milky Way photos with many, many different and vibrant colors. Two examples would be: www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/center-milky-way-galaxy-212176753?src=vPtpUe07ZTkJ74kkth5hLQ-1-11 and instagram.com/bigtexstudios/ Just wondering does this involve some sort of more advanced, complicated workflow and might be too hard for entry level users? Thanks!

You are welcome. And the answers are yes. Sort of. Yes it CAN involve a more advanced workflow that is hard for entry level users. BUT you can also get more color in your images by turning up the vibrance and saturation sliders. My guess is on the one of JUST the Milky Way and no foregound at the Shutterstock link, that a more advanced technique of stacking is used. Taking 7-40 images of the same stars and then stacking them in a way to bring out color and really accent the features in the Milky Way. One of my favorite videos that teach these methods come from Ian Norman over at Lonely Speck: His recent video on noise-free Starry Landscape Stacker for those using a MAC: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-AQOfTTGWEDo.html His video for MAC and PC users who have Photoshop and are willing to MANUALLY align their stack: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-zzVSm64zq44.html And lastly his video on the LRGB method that can REALLY bring out the colors in your image in astonishing ways: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Rltg47Q64W0.html These methods are not terribly accessible to all users and take some time to learn and get good at. I am working on finding a good accessible solution for the every day user but haven't found it yet. Lastly, you can always process your images with exaggerated colors. I believe that is what BigTex has done with his images but I also think he stacked some of them. Just not clear on which ones if any. But if you turn up your vibrance and saturation and you can bring out more of that stuff in your Milky Way. If you do, I recommend you DO NOT do it on a global edit but use the adjustment brush and only apply it to the night sky. (I really should do a video on all the styles of Milky Way processing and the different steps you take to get there...probably a great plan for this winter when I have more time because the Milky Way Core is no longer visible at night.) Just know that you can do anything YOU WANT to your Milky Way processing. My video is just a PLAIN, MIDDLE OF THE ROAD non-dynamic example. It is basic. It is easy to reproduce. It brings out the Milky Way in your images and is a good STARTING POINT. What anyone does different than it is their personal taste. I recommend finding your personal taste and it sounds like vibrant colors would be closer to what you want to achieve. GO FOR IT! :D It IS ALWAYS an artistic representation of the Milky Way unless you take great efforts to avoid messing up the Milky Way processing you do by following Roger Clark's complicated but well-thought out methods at www.clarkvision.com/articles/color.of.the.night.sky/ Hope that helps! Good luck learning Stacking! I truly STILL AM learning stacking myself. It is a 2nd or 3rd year doing Milky Way Photography technique in my opinion. -Aaron

Did I miss something? He didn't completely show how you did dodging and burning? I saw him create 3 masks for dark areas, bright, and light pollution, but he never showed what edits you did in them to make it pop. Can someone explain?

Haha great idea and you read my mind! I actually have part of the video already recorded where I took a group of images to stack the foreground when I was down in Escalante. I will see if I can get that out this month! 😃 -Aaron

Awesome!! Can't wait :)

😃 Thanks! -Aaron

Nope! No tracker. Just a static tripod and taking a panorama. It was his first time out doing Milky Way and it turned out fantastic! It goes to show that with really only a few steps figured out, you can accomplish really solid Milky Way Photography from your very first night out! :D -Aaron

Very nice. I tried my 1st milky way photo last weekend. No luck I'm afraid. It was sort of cloudy and and I'm in a bortle class 4 and the only spot I could come up with was shooting sort of towards a class 5.. I'll get there eventually. I've never even seen the milky-way in person before. That's what drew my interest. And I love photography

Yeah I know. Isn't it sad? I am going to miss the whole NIK Collection once an Adobe update breaks it on my lightroom and photoshop....but until then it is great to use. Thanks for watching, Joy! -Aaron