How to plan, shoot, and edit the Milky Way 

looks like the dark sky site you recommend has suffered a melt down :(

If you have live view on your camera, just zoom into a particularly bright star (with the zoom buttons, not the lens) and manual focus on it. Everything should be in focus. Saves you getting glue on your lens.

I found this so helpful and will refer back to it. I did some astrophotography back in the day using an OM1, focusing screen, piggybacked on a telescope. There wasn't much processing done and it was film, Fuji super HG 400. Now that I have aged myself, regarding exposure times, I was taught the "black card" method where a black card was held in front of the lens, shutter was tripped and the card pulled away for very close timing. The card was put back and the exposure ended. No wobble. I just purchased a Canon T6i amateur DLSR. I am not a pro and and I may use this technique. I found Roy's explanation of LR very helpful. I am struggling with what software to purchase and when people are demonstrating LR, I have a hard time following. But Roy made it clear enough on a basic level that I may choose LR. I can't say enough about how much this tutorial helped. thanks, Roy!!

I went to watch like 3-5 mins of your video then watched the whole thing. Fantastic job.

You what? One of the best tutorials I've seen so far on how to shoot the milky way. Very clear and uncomplicated.On top of that you've managed to explain it even for the people who aren't able to go full frame and/or use expensive glass. Kudos to you my friend.

Instagram follower here. This is so awesome! Thanks! Although I must admit, you lost me at 2:00 because I barely even qualify as an amateur photographer lol. I'm just a guy who loves space and would like to one day take a decent picture with my crappy camera. Even if I never get to take a bad ass shot, I very much appreciate this tutorial, very clear and concise, and I assume very easy to follow for actual photographers.

Usually I avoid all the videos longer than 5-10 minutes, but this one I really enjoyed. Lots of details but not boring, real-world examples, and I also like that you made the end-to-end tutorial, starting before you even took your camera, and ending with the final product. Great job!

Best tutorial I’ve seen in years

This is by far the best, fastest moving, information packed, clearly spoken and shown instructional video on not just photography, but Lightroom and other apps. Start to finish this is amazing!

WOW! Everything I was looking forward to learn, compacted in a single video! Great job!

Hands-down one of the best, most thorough start-to-finish tutorials on planning and executing a shoot that I've ever watched. Well done!

Brilliant video! Will watch it again and again when I head to Maine this Summer to try it out.

Oh my, what a wonderful tutorial chock-full of amazing education about shooting the night sky!! He gave three great websites to prepare for your shoot so you know exactly when and where to point your camera. At the end of the tutorial the before and after is just wonderful to see. The is a perfect example of why shooting RAW in a situation where you NEED ALL of the embedded information so you can bring it out later. In this case, since he shot with RAW, later he was manually able to adjust the pixels that you can't see with the naked eye into something truly beautiful!! The Milky Way was there in the photo all along (tho you can't see it at first) but with adjustments to the pixels later (shown in the video) the MW comes into beautiful view!! Again, this tutorial is great because he shows you how to do the MOST important part: PREPARE for a nighttime Milky Way shoot. Even if at 3 am, in the middle of the grand canyon, you cannot see the Milky Way very well... if you PREPARED as he shows, then you will know exactly where and when to point your camera and SHOOT! Your lens and the RAW format will pick up details that your eye cannot see at the time you shoot, so don't worry if you can't see the MW very well. Later you can use your own "photo lab" (Lightroom or Camera Raw or PS) to bring up the details that RAW captured for you. Amazing! Thank you for a great educational experience. This was time well spent as a photographer!! :)

Nice work, guys. I'm headed out to the Painted Hills this weekend to try my hand at my first night sky shots. Thanks a ton for giving me a head start to figure this out.

you have the most explanatory video of Astro Photography i have come across on RU-vid. for the longest time i could not get my settings right for my camera and you are the only one who goes through the settings in detail. great editing tutorial as well. you have earned yourself a subscriber!!

The best tutorial i ever seen. Excellent use of language, very nice tone voice, instructive and liked a lot the editing part. love your work, well done.

I'm looking into getting into photography and I've always loved nightscape photos. I'm glad that you've shown us that you can get an amazing shot with just a standard kit lense.

Thank you so much, I'm sure that it is going to help me a lot.

Excellent tutorial. Some hints I had not thought of like switching off stabilisation. Thanks.

amazing tutorial. I learned so much about Lightroom.

Thank you for this very informative video. Your ability to explain complicated things in plain English is a good trait. Take care and happy shooting:-)

A manual focus wide to ultra wide lens focused at infinity is also a perfect choice.

Found the video a bit late but this goes of everything so well. Much better than the others I've watched

26:45 for my favourite tonality

So far the easiest step by step I have seen for this kind of editing. THANKS!!!!

amazing tutorial, gained a sub here, will be following your work, love it!

I have to say this is both one of the most comprehensive and one the the clearest MW video tutorials I've viewed. Given the number of videos out there that off tips on photographing the MW, to stand out as much as your video does from the crowd is a real achievement. I can't wait to try your tips out!

Very good information, timely as well since I'll be riding my motorcycle from Sacramento, Ca to Death Valley on Nov 28th and it was no coincidence I scheduled it for the new moon on the 29th. I decided to go ahead and buy a better suited lens for imaging the Milky Way, I couldn't resist the special B&H had on an ideal lens, being a Samyang 14mm f/2.8 ultra wide field. I know other lenses can be used and I was even considering either my kit lens 18-55mm (as you mentioned) or even my 24-107mm f/4L Canon. But the price on the Samyang was irresistable at only $269, it normally sells for around $329 and when you consider Canon's premium 14mm f/2.8L at over $2,000, I think the Samyang will do the job quite well, in fact it comes in with excellent reviews from reputable sources. Samyang makes under private label Rokinon and Bower versions, so price is the difference when comparing those three. Now I have great focal length and fast lens, pretty much spot on for imaging the galaxy arm. Too bad I can't haul my German Equatorial Mount, but I don't think that will work being about 80 lbs of metal on the back of a motorcycle. The tripod alone would be impossible because it's non collapsible and heavy, people would think I was hauling part of a bridge around. I jumped from visual astronomy to astro imaging about 2.5 years ago and it's been a long and slow learning curve, notwithstanding mechanical gremlins affecting a couple mounts I own. I finally saved up and took the advice of seasoned imagers and bought a premier Astro Physics mount recently, now I'm broke again, lol. This trip will be my first to the valley, always wanted to go there on a motorcycle and since it has extremely dark skies the two nights we are there, it would have been a crime if I didn't try my hand at imaging the Milky Way under ideal conditions, well, as long as some unplanned clouds don't pay us a visit. So far what I have seen of the lens I like, at f/2.8 the light gathering this thing can do is outstanding. I didn't pick up any distortions or wavy edges, these things happen sometimes, but the positive reviews of the lens far exceeds it's price point. If it's clear out I want to dial in a few things before setting up in the valley, that will save time and frustration. The lens is 100% manual, not a problem with the kind of shooting I'll be doing with it, how do you auto focus on a star? However, focusing through it's viewfinder presents a little challenge, it's difficult to discern whether the inner circle is in focus, as you mentioned, I'll likely pre focus it during the day time and good advice to tape up the lens afterwards. I think a good solution would be a Bahtinov focusing mask, very accurate means of deep sky focusing when using a imaging telescope, but I don't know if a template is made small enough for the 14mm lens and how would you mount it in front of the lens? Problem being the face of the lens is a wannabe fish eye, having a convex shape and not something you can attach the Bahtinov to. Oh well, I'll either do some day time focusing or simply mount it on a tripod and take a series of test shots pointing skyward. One point you made I have a question about regarding focusing. You mentioned turning the focusing ring to infinity, but very often the infinity scale is inaccurate, in fact you can't depend on it in most cases. Some say turn the ring to infinity then back off a bit, but that's not a solution either if you don't want blurry stars. I would opt for a totally different method and the daytime suggestion is a good one. Since I don't use lenses for deep sky imaging, I can't offer a sure fire tip other than test shots, zoom in, check, and do it again until you have focus. Not a big deal at all and I'm sure this method will achieve accurate results, but I'm sure there are many other ideas on the web that one could source easy enough. I might even utilize an artificial star and try that for fun. It's basically a high powered LED flashlight with a number of measured holes drilled through the cap to simulate real stars. This nifty device works in lieu of a real star for the purpose of collimating your telescope, mainly Schmidt-Cassegrains or Ritchey Chretien designs. There are other variations, but they share in common the use of mirrors to reflect incoming star light and directing that light eventually to the focuser eyepiece or camera. Collimating is the process of adjusting several screws based on the image from a bright star or in this case, an artificial one. The goal is to have a shadow image inside a set of perfectly round circles. The beauty of the LED artificial star is the fact it stays put, unaffected by earth's rotation. Even though it's main function is the collimation process, I see no reason why it can't serve as an aid for focusing too, just as long as you have enough distance between the camera lens and the artificial star that is. I've heard 100' or more is about right. I'm really looking forward to this adventure as long as we don't run into bad weather over the mountain passes. For this reason we have to take an alternate route, going over the mountains in the Southern Sierra Nevada range instead of I/80 up north, a freeway I live only 6 miles from, dang! Thanks for your informative tutorial and I'm looking forward to any follow up videos.

Great information here. I have a photo shoot planned in the Big Bend area of Texas in January. This information was exactly what I needed for hopefully a successful shoot!

omg when i first started watching this video i was like oh man this is gonna sooo boring, but no this was soooooo useful although ik i won’t be shooting astrophotography anytime soon this was great 👌🏽

The best 30 minutes I've ever spent in any kind of tutorial. Nice work The Finer Photo guy!

If you want 17 seconds just put the shutter speed on 'bulb' and time it ;)

Excellent and useful information for all photographers interested in best-practices to begin night sky photography.

Big like !!,Thank you very much

Excellent tutorial, and delivered in an easy to understand and follow manner. I want to have a go now!! Thank you.

focusing... with Canon you have LiveView - just zoom in on the brightest star (or light in the distance) and you're good to go no need to focus in daylight and then having to tape the lens for later in the evening that's nonsense

Thanks for all the info! Just shot from Mt St Helens on July 14th. Popular place... there were lots of photographers out for the same shoot. Can't believe how much Portland, OR polluted the sky. For a first try of the milky way, I am BEYOND happy. Thank you so much. Now I need the tutorial on photo shopping in the foreground.

were you standing still for 20 seconds? or did you combine two different pictures?

Thank you. Im on a mission to learn about my new canon 5d mark iv camera in 2 days before my trip to milky way. This video saved my trip!!!!

Great video! Going to Machu Picchu in a couple of weeks and try to take some pictures. Although I'm missing your follow up videos?!?! Are they coming or are you not planning on making them?

Hey, man....I can't say enough about how helpful this video was. My first attempt at shooting the Milky Way was based on a whole complicated set of misconceptions, which this effort has pretty much thoroughly cleared up for me. Most appreciated. Really.

I use sky guide app on iOS, it's more simple then stellarium

I have watched a ton of these and yours is by far the best explanation on how to edit the milky way! (that was the piece I needed) thank thank thank

Awesome tutorial, easy to follow and take notes! Thanks so much!

10:28 There's one more thing you get in the dark areas of your map: Sasquatch.

awesome video! best instructional i've seen on YT regarding shooting the milky way. can't wait to try this out.

only problem i have now is here in India there's no dark skies anymore 😂

We used Stellarium at my university for astronomy class. This is a way more informative video on how to use the program compared to my university.

I've always pronounced it Stel-lar-ium, like aquarium. Anyone know which is correct?

By far the BEST video I have found on youtube for taking night sky photos. Thank you!!

If you want to expose for 17s you just have to shoot in bulb mode:)

I've studied a lot of this in the last month and this vid covers it all and very well.

just focus manually in live view ;)

Excellent guidance, particularly the use of Stellarium to precisely plan the shoot. Many thanks.

Is Canon 70d a good cam to do astrophotography?

I just bought a Canon SL3 for a trip under the stars. It doesn’t get here until the day before we leave, but I’m feeling confident because of this video I’ll be able to get at least one good shot. Thank you so much for it!

love the photo with the person in it but with the long exposure how did you freeze him/yourself?

Well thought out video - bookmark it! There's a lot of detail here and you should be sure to write some of the key factors down in your photo log book - don't have one, get one and use it religiously, as well as other issues with doing night photography. Things like turning off image stabilization, adj. exposure factors for non-full frame cameras (I use a sony a6000 - not full frame) and Lightroom tools where the video assumes good working knowledge of Lightroom can make or break a photograph. Remember as Ansel once said "You don't take a photograph, you make a photograph"

500 divided by 28.6 not 28.6 divided by 500. I guess that's obvious....but just in case anyone was confused....

Thank you for this video. AT LAST I know how to improve my astro snaps. The 'edit' portion of the video is MOST enlightening, no pun intended whatsoever. 10*

28.8 / 500 = 17.36 ?!

Excellent tutorial. Thank you!

Why didn't you just use Bulb, and did a manual shoot? that way you can hold it down for 17 seconds, or better yet, buy a remote to help you do that?

This is the best video of it's kind. I have been looking for a video which shows me everything I need to know thank you

That guy stood there and not moving for 20s ?

Well done. You know your stuff and you were able to bring that forward. Well spoken.

I regret to inform the people of Europe, your nearest dark sky without light pollution is in Africa

I would say one of the best video on night sky photography for beginners.. Specially the planning and editing part! Thanks bro!

in Stellarium, you can set it to use decimal degrees in the Config Settings - press F2, then Tools tab (wrench icon), then tick "Use Decimal Degrees" on the right column of options

Really clear presentation. It helps me a lot. If not done yet a tutorial about printing the pic would be good too.

Thank u very much... i hv been searching for milky way shoot video done with crop sensor....n finally u made it happen..u can't imagine how much happy i m...it would b great help with this information ...Thanks!!

The best tutorial I've seen to plan & shot the milkyway. Very helpful. Thanks!

Mate, this is the best astro photography tutorial I've watched. Details from start to finish. Thank you.

This was an awesome video! Why doesn’t this channel have more subscribers? This is golden information right here. Awesome video, finer photo!

Such comprehensive video!! Good work!

Sky safari is also an amazing app that will not only give you minute by minute star maps, but you can skip forward or backwards by location, date, and direction. Almost an all in one stop app for night photographers.

Thanks for lightroom tips! great video!

What a nice job. I appreciate how you have incorporated so many different tips & tools needed to shoot the milky way.

Very informative and saver of lots of trouble in the field.Thanks a lot for sharing your knowledge...Highly apreciated

Fantastic tutorial! From start to finish one of the best I've seen. Prepping for my first Milky Way shoot and you unlocked all my questions. Thank you!

Complete information. Thanks for sharing such a nice video packed with information.

I will try to do this next week. I will be camping at the darkest area according to the map and Im so excited! Thank you

Thank you. You are a good instructor.

thanks for showing and explaining why you do everything the way that you do! taught me a bunch! :)

By far the best tutorial on shooting the Milky Way I've seen on here. Thanks for the Lightroom tips; they'll certainly come in handy. Well done indeed!

Great tutorial. Not just some camera / lens settings but the 80% planing before you leave the house. All the helpful prediction and navigation apps. Dude you covered it. I'd fly you out in to the out back anytime for some star shooting. ~ your neighbor

Long exposure noise reduction is actually not reducing our noise (quite the contrary - its adding noise a little bit, but that goes to far physics for this). The camera takes a black image after your exposure is complete with the same exposure time and ISO but with closed shutter. That black image is (dependend on exposure time, ISO and camera) not complete dark, but contains some glow, mostly at the sides and corners of the image. This glow is because of heating during the exposure. With long exposure noise reduction you get rid of this glow and also of some sensor errors called Hot-Pixel (those get more visible with higher ISO and longer exposures).

Awesome explanatory video. I loved the way you have explained the smallest details for a beginner like me. thanks a lot

GREAT great info. All the tools to do the homework. I am now setup to try my shot on July 14, 2018. Can not wait to get into editing it. :) BTW... I hope this helps.. Lat and Long... the increments of degrees are broken up into minutes and seconds. Like time... hours are broken up into minutes (60 per hour) and seconds ( 60 per minute ). The same is true for Lat and Long. So, 34.5 degrees is the same as 34 deg, 30 minutes. So, multiply your decimal degrees to 60 and you will have the total minutes. Take the decimal of the minutes and multiply that by 60 and you will have the seconds.

This is going to help me a lot! I just started getting into it and wanted to see the settings for it and best way to edit to make the milky way stand out! Definitely going to come back to this video to reference!

Very helpful video. Thank you!

Tip: You can just paste the coordinates from google without having to search again to get the coordinates in the DMS (Decimal, Minutes, Seconds) format. If you paste the DD format (Decimal degrees) from google into stellarium it will convert for you.

in stellarium, you can just type in a decimal coordinate and it will convert it, just select everything in the box first.

Thank you for the details....going to the Grand Canyon soon, and hoping I can get a shot of the Milky Way while I'm there. Now I know how to set up and have a decent chance to make it.

Solid! Thanks for showing us your workflow!

Great tutorial thanks for sharing! This pollution map is pretty easy to use too.

one thing i didn't hear you mention is to lock the mirror up to help reduce camera shake, I use a wired remote control and tripod, I lock my mirror up so I don't have to have the 2 sec delay to take my image. ;) Great tutorial!

Excellent tutorial - and common sense feature on using LR. Thank you very much👍

It's now 2020 and for keeping a lens at infinity focus, there's a couple of tricks you can apply with some newer lenses (depending on the lens, and on the camera settings). When you have a mirrorless camera with one of those new-fangled "focus by wire" lenses, the focus does not change when turning the focus-ring unless you're in manual focus mode. So when the camera is off, you do not need to have any worry about that ring turning and you loosing your proper focus. Now if you also set up your camera for "back button focussing", so that auto-focus is not triggered by the shutter button but only by one of the buttons on the rear, you will not ever have to lose the proper focus of your camera in auto focus mode. You just pre-focus once with the back button, take a picture to verify proper focus, and don't touch the focus button again. There's also now a manual focus lens that has a special focus-lock ring: the IRIX Blackstone and Firefly lenses. The 15mm version has a 2.4 aperture which is still quite useful for astrophotography. Focus lock ring means you don't have to tape your lens focus ring down, and you still don't have to worry about losing focus. It also has a focus-ring-dedent at infinity but for that to work properly you may have to calibrate the lens a little bit.

Excellent video. I really like your presenting style too! Great job.