Noctilucent Clouds July 12th

[Rick]

Anyone tried photographing this evening's selection yet?

[RobertM]

Yes I have 20 or so shots, it's really spectacular.  Will post as soon as I get the camera in.

[RobertM]

Here are the best of the bunch:

22:16


22:21



22:48 (fading and a bit out of focus!)



Robert

[Rick]

I took a few shots, the best of which was this one, taken from my upstairs window with my point-and-shoot Canon IXUS 75.



Photo taken at 21:28 UTC (22:28 BST) on July 12th 2009.

[Rick]

Great shots, Robert. Where abouts were you? My view (from Oprington) was slightly hampered by lower-level clouds.

[RobertM]

Thanks Rick.  I'm in Mayfield Avenue; unfortunately I'm in a little trough and surrounded by trees at the back.  That's a lovely wide angle shot and pretty good for a point and shoot.

[Rick]

Ah. So you did have the low level clowd too, but mostly it was below your horizon.

What camera+lens+exposure were you using?

[Rick]

It's looking promising for this evening, too. Keep an eye on the sky.

[RobertM]

They were all taken with a EOS450D and EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS kit lens.

TOP
Time: 22:16
ISO: 800
Aperture: F4
Shutter: 0.6s

MIDDLE
Time: 22:21
ISO: 200
Aperture: F4
Shutter: 3.2s

BOTTOM
Time: 22:48
ISO: 200
Aperture: F3.5
Shutter: 15s

The spare room upstairs has a better view so I'll try that if they appear tonight.

[Whitters]

First time I've ever seen them. Worked out why I always look too late in the evening. This was near the end, I have some more to process and put up. -- You can just make out the front paws of Ursa Major above the house.
Canon 30D 1 second f3.5 ISO400 Focal Length 22mm
12-07-2009 21:59 GMT

[Rick]

This evening's display was rather low and mostly behind lower cloud, so I didn't get any photos.

Paul, was your photo taken yesterday, or this evening?

[Whitters]

It was Yesterday - the 12th. I've added the details. I have some panarama's but they need processing.
Canon 30D 0.6 second f4.5 ISO400 Focal Length 90mm
12-07-2009 21:48 GMT

[Rick]

Very pretty, Paul!

[RobertM]

That's excellent Paul but I think it could do with brightening a tad to bring out the detail a bit more.

[Mike]

Nice one guys. Great pics for this months Members Images section of the meeting.

[Whitters]

Hi Robert, I have brightened it a little, but I wanted to get a representation of what I saw with my eyes on the night, this is pretty close. I have longer exposure images which show more detail, too much on this image and it will start to look noisy. I have more from earlier in the evening that I hope to post up soon.

[Whitters]

Not too happy with the stitch, but it gives the idea if the extent of the cloud again from the 12th July
Canon 30D 0.6 second f3.5 ISO400 Focal Length 18mm
12-07-2009 21:27GMT

[Mike]

Paul use the photomerge function in photoshop. Works a treat for stitching images together.

[RobertM]

That looks really good Paul, hopefully PS can sort out the stitch mark.  Are your skies really that dark where you are ?

[Whitters]

Thanks Mike I'll take a look at that.
Robert, I applied stretch and levels to brighten the low light detail. The sky is pretty good to the north The nearest town in that direction is about 8 miles away. It's brighter to the south with the edge of Uckfield about a mile. We have an old factory sight which has sodium lighting about half a mile from us to the north, and you can see the red in the cloud on one of the earlier images.

[Ian]

Have a go at vignette correction on the original images Paul, see if you can sort out the darkening. I'd tell you how, but I use the Raw plugin that came with the camera to fix mine...

[Whitters]

Thanks Ian, I'll take a look at the canon site and see if they have anything like that