Milky Way Timelapse as seen from Williams Arizona
About This Timelapse Sequence
The arm of the Milky Way Galaxy stretches across the sky and races through it over the course of several hours. The deep blue hue of the star filled night slowly gives way to a green sky as the dawn approaches.
Several meteors streaked through this seen as the timelapse images were being captured. You can see them all in a single frame in the print version of this composition.
This timelapse sequence is comprised of 293- 30 second exposures captured every 62 seconds over the course of 5 hours. All of this done while camping near Dogtown Lake in Williams, AZ recently.
Right around the 8 second mark you can see the Andromeda Galaxy rise from behind the trees at continue upward into the night sky.
Why I Enjoy Shooting Timelapse
Here’s the thing I like about shooting this way. I can create a timelapse video output and show the motion of the stars in a compressed time frame. [or rather “apparent motion of the stars as caused by the Earth’s rotation”]. I can also stack all of the exposures into a single “Star Trails” still image which convey’s several hours’ movement in a single moment. And finally I can combine the two techniques to varying degrees to create a video with streaking stars moving across the sky; or pulses that shoot out and streak then fade from back to front. Or trail back and forth. There are some many output options, and my computers processor can’t keep up with my imagination. So for now, I’ve captured the elements, and I’ve output this simple version, and I hope you like it.
Connect with Me and See More
I captured some other images during this trip to Dogtown Lake in Williams, AZ. Check out this post from a few weeks ago where I explain how I created a very large Panoramic HDR of the sun setting over the lake.
Did you enjoy this timelapse of the Milky Way? Let me know what you think in the comments below, and to stay informed of my photographic exploits, follow me on Facebook and Twitter.
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