Tonight (8/12/2011) and tomorrow night are the peak of the Perseid meteor shower and I must admit I’ve pretty excited about it. The last meteor show that I tried to shoot, I failed pretty miserably at. So honestly I’m not so sure you want to be taking tips from be, but I’ve done quite a bit of research and thinking through the process that should allow for some better results this time.
According to the news tonight you should look towards the North or North East around the Perseus constellation. There is supposed to be a full moon tonight that will add some difficulty in getting a good shot, and cross your fingers you don’t have any cloud cover. The news also said that the best time to see the meteor shower would be around 3 – 4 am.
Items You’ll Need:
Tripod
DSLR camera
Wide angle lens
Wired or wireless remote trigger
Plenty of battery juice
Black card
Flashlight w/batteries
Now lets briefly talk about why you need these items and/or what you should/could do with them.
A tripod is going to be a must to give you a good solid base, as you’ll be doing some long exposure shots. A tripod is not a must but a solid base is and a tripod is the logical choice. A dslr camera does much better in low light and allows you to shoot much longer than a point-and-shoot camera. Trust me when shooting meteor showers you can’t get too wide. I wide angle lens is a must and the wider the better.
Wired or wireless remote triggers will allow you to shoot much longer than without and will also reduce vibration introduced to the camera, which will make for better shots. Other things you can do to reduce vibration are to turn off IS or VR on your lens, and to shoot in Live View.
In shooting long exposure shots a fully charged batter or a few of them is a must, as it will gobble up your batter juice in no time. A black card (mine is just a black piece of cardboard) will allow you to use techniques to get multiple meteors in one shot while leaving the rest of the stars static. The flashlight can help you get to your location, as you’ll need to find a dark location away from city lights to shoot from. Not only that you’ll be able to use a flashlight to do some light painting which could add some really interesting foreground subjects to your shot.
Additional Tips:
There are some other things you should know about shooting stars/meteor showers. One such item is that focusing at night can be so difficult. Since the moon will be out tonight you could use it to focus your camera. Other things you can use a really bright star with your focus point right on it (easier said than done), or a light far off in the distance. After you get it focused once switch your lens to manual focus and as long as you don’t touch it you should be good the rest of the night. The other alternative is going with manual focusing all the way.
When shooting stars to keep them from streaking you’ll want to keep your exposure shorter than 30 – 45 seconds. Anything longer than that and you’ll have some streaking to your stars. Then again streaked stars can look really great so choose which option fits your vision, or hey try both.
If you go for the streaked star look and want them to go in a circle, then point your camera due Norht.
Lets Talk About Settings:
I think I’ve already covered exposure so lets move on to the f value. I typically shoot around 9 – 11 when I shoot stars. That being said, I’ve seen some shot around 2.8 that look amazing too. So play around with that but that should give you a pretty good place to start. So after you decide on your exposure and f value then adjust the brightness of the shot with your ISO. I’m probably going to start with an ISO around 800.
Wrap Up:
Well I hope this helps you out with your shots of the meteor shower. If you have additional tips please leave them in the comments. Also, if you found anything here useful let me know and share a link to your meteor shots in the comments as well; I’d love to see your shots. Happy shooting!
Update:
The weather didn't cooperate with me so I didn't get any shots of the meteor shower, but here is one that I did get.
Update:
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