My first Night Sky Pictures

This evening I went out and took my first night sky photographs with my new 50mm lens on my Nikon D80. It was so cold the stubble on my upper lip froze. It took me a while to find the right place to take pictures of the night sky, but after trying several locations I found a decent spot. Now this is my first night sky adventure so they are not the greatest images. I think I might have bumped the focus a bit, or the fifteen seconds that I set the shutter speed to was to long. On my next trip I think I will bump up my ISO to 800 and drop the shutter speed down to twelve seconds. I have played around with the pictures in Photoshop a bit, but just to adjust the colors and brightness a little. I hope you enjoy these and my other pictures and please feel free to leave a comment.

There was a bit of fog hanging over the valley that was helping to show these lights shooting up into the sky. I thought they would make a cool picture and they did. 

With this one I just looked for the brightest star. After I took the picture and looked at it on my LCD screen I was surprised at how many stars there were that I did not see. 

At the bottom of this picture you can see a few clouds. Looking through the viewfinder I did not see them, but I think they add a nice touch to the picture.

What can I say about this one. I think it speaks for itself.

The light coming from behind the mountains is from Salt Lake City. At first I was not going to shoot this direction, but I decided I would because I wanted to see just how much light pollution there was. I think the picture turned out pretty good. 

Again, what can I say!

Of the pictures I took this evening this is probably my favorite one. 

In this picture I just love the amount of stars in one area. I think Orion's Belt is in the middle of the picture. I did not bring my Night Sky map with me, so I am not 100% on this. Also if you look through the pictures you can see satellite trails running through the pictures. 

So, there they are. My first attempt at capturing the night sky. Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to come back soon. 

B.D. Young