Landscape Astro Workshops!
Over the past few years I've spent a lot of time out with my camera pointed at the milkyway. A lot I have learned from youtube, some I have learned from trial and error (so. much. error).
Milkyway Core rising over the Waikato River
I often get asked by people if they can come out and learn this sort of stuff while I'm shooting, but that can be difficult if I'm shooting as well.
So as part of my plan to start taking this into a fulltime career, I would like to begin to offer some workshops teaching this sort of photography and post processing. That way while we're out doing this, my time is dedicated to showing people what to do, rather than my own images.
The Milkyway rises over Mt Doom itself!
So with a new moon just gone, and the next one towards the end of the month I'd like to do a test run with two or three people keen on being guinea pigs for how I intend on running these.
Pauanui
Because this sort of photography is weather and location critical, we'll need to be flexible on dates. I am targeting Friday/Sat/Sun 27/28/29 May. This will be based in the Waikato/Western BOP/Southern Coromandel region. So you'll need to be willing to travel to the location and keep all three nights free leading up to it. We will pick the best night based on the weather forecast. (We will only be shooting the one evening).
What we will cover:
Gear: Unfortunately Landscape Astro photography is somewhat gear dependent. That said you don’t need tens of thousands worth of equipment to get started with it. I posted a couple of blog posts last year regarding Landscape Astro, the gear section can be read here.
Planning. This is probably the biggest part of shooting this sort of thing. Again, I have a blog post written that covers how I plan these shoots.
The third blog post was all about the shooting process, which we will cover in the field - this will include how to work out your settings and how to manually focus to ensure the stars are sharp.
Finally, a short youtube video on how I edit these available only to participants and contributors on Patreon will be produced.
What you will need:
1: An interchangeable lens camera and a wide angle lens. Not saying that this sort of stuff can’t be done with point and shoots to some extent and even smartphones these days, but we’re going to start with people who have already invested in some dedicated photography gear. The lens ideally should be wide angle and have a maximum aperture of f/3.5 or faster at its widest focal length. This is still not ideal, but I’m aiming this at beginners who most likely have an 18-55mm kit lens with their camera. If you have access to something wider and with a wider max aperture, bring it! I will be able to loan my 16mm f/1.4 to anyone shooting with the Fuji X Series.
Tripod: This is a must. Shooting the milkyway comes under the umbrella of “Long Exposure Photography” and as we will be having our shutters open for up to and sometimes longer than 30 seconds, the camera needs to be held in place without it being able to be shaken. I will have spares with me on the day though.
WARM CLOTHES. You’re going out at night, in mid Autumn. No ones needs to bring Hypothermia home along with their epic Milkyway shot.
Editing Software: To bring the best out of the Milkyway, we will be shooting RAW and post-processing the Image. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop are probably the most popular editing tools worldwide and are what I use to edit all of my images. Worth the purchase! The editing side of things will be based in Lightroom, and a little Photoshop for more advanced users
Because this is a bit of a dry run, i’ll be keeping it to three people maximum and a nice and cheap $50 per person. Of course if the weather doesn’t play ball on any of the dates, full refunds will be sent out to everyone.
So! If you’re interested, go check it out in the Workshops tab here on the website!