Category: Uncategorized

Just some of the photos or links to YouTube videos featuring my photography.

This is one of many timelapse photos shot on June 11, 2025. Looking northwest from my backyard. On a mobile device, you can zoom in with the pinch maneuver. The resolution is not the highest, as this is JPG file 1.14 MB in size.

Dimensions: 5502 x 2736 pixels.

Sony ILCE-7RM5
Sigma 50mm ART lens
f/1.6
2.5 second exposure
ISO-100.
Manual focus
Aperture Priority

The transition from very bright daylight to dark night skies is handled smoothly by the Sony in aperture priority. ISO minimium shutter speed is set to 4 seconds. ISO is AUTO with 100 min and 3200 max. Sensitivity is LOW. Interval Priority is ON so the interval takes priority over the shutter speed, as frames could be skipped if shutter speed is longer than the interval.

Above is the same photo, altered in Lightroom Classic to brighten up the foreground while maintaining the house lights and deeper sky. The orange haze is just that–haze that is reflecting the light from the houses, and the camera really magnifies that light.

It would be simpler to just set up for night sky photography, or day photography if I was just shooting single shots, but doing timelapse means allowing for the change in lighting, as I’m shooting one frame every 8 seconds and creating videos from them.

Below, I used a new program called DXO Photo Lab 8 to create this image from the same group of photos above. I’ll not be using Lightroom anymore. I’ll be cancelling and purchasing this great new program after the 30-day free trial is over.

This photo can be zoomed and cropped even more. Also, this is not the best quality image, as I was shooting in the lowest quality JPG setting to reduce image size for hundreds of frames of timelapse.

I’ll have to try this as a single shot in RAW and see what I can achieve using DXO Photo Lab 8.

June 15, 2025 – I’m not sure I want to spend the $$$ on the DXO Photo Lab software. Lightroom Classic may be just fine for what I need.

Or any other type of night time lights.

Set White Balance to Incandescent (or Daylight if they’re LED lights).

• If you’re using a tripod, turn SteadyShot OFF and set the ISO to 100. If handheld, turn SteadyShot ON and set the ISO to 200 or 400 (depending upon how bright the lights are). The picture below of old Las Vegas was taken with a tripod and a 500mm lens.
• Use Spot Metering and aim the camera so the metering area is filled with lights; then use AE Lock to lock the exposure.
• Recompose your image and shoot away!

Create a focus magnifier that is extreme. From Friedman.

Focus Magnifier – for even greater focusing accuracy, the camera will show you a magnified view of any portion of your frame, allowing you to focus critically. (Peaking Setting can still work here too, but sometimes the contrast isn’t high enough to show the color.)

This is a function that you have to assign to a button – I use the C4 button. (MENU → → Operation Customize → (Images) Custom Key/Dial Setting → [Choose a button – I recommend “Custom Button 4”] → 26 → Focus Assist → Focus Magnifier.

Once assigned, hit the Focus Magnifier button, then use the arrow keys (either on the Multi-selector or the rear control wheel) to tell the camera which part of the viewfinder you want to magnify, then hit the center button.

Focus critically. Want more magnification? Hit the center button
again. Then hit the shutter release button halfway to go back to Live View and shoot at your leisure.

The histogram display simply shows you where the brightness in your image “falls” within the 14-stop range. It is useful when you are shooting subjects that are predominantly white (like a bride in a wedding dress) or black (like portraits of black cats on black backgrounds), and you need to know if the sensor is capturing the detail that the LCD cannot show you.

It’s also doubly useful when you’re reviewing your images outdoors on a bright day and your LCD screen is getting washed out. Being able to see what you captured graphically can be a stress-reducer out in the field! The histogram shows you the range of brightness values in your image, rearranged in order, with the most frequently-occurring brightnesses being taller.

Left edge is the DARKEST value the camera sensor can capture.

Right edge is the BRIGHTEST value the camera sensor can capture.

When reviewing a histogram for any image, any part of the image that is “off the scale” or blown out will blink.

This graphic is a good explanation of light.

What is a “stop” or “f/stop?”

A “stop” means “a factor of two” in light intensity. So when it says a digital sensor can sense a range of brightness of 14 stops, it means that the brightest part of the picture is no more than 214 = about 16 thousand times brighter than the darkest part of the picture.

Put another way, if you were using the spot metering feature of the camera and you were to measure the brightest and darkest parts of your scene, and the brightest part reads 1/1,000th of a second, then the darkest part must read no less than 8 seconds (14 stops away) for everything to be visible.

Above, not my photo. I snagged it from American Scientific.

To get good moon shots, a long lens is needed for greater magnification. 300mm is pretty darned great… but a 200mm will work quite well, as well.

Here are the camera settings:

1. Set the shooting mode to Manual (M).
2. Set the focal length according to the Moon size and the framing (composition) you want.
3. Set the aperture to f/8.
4. Focus on the subject.
5. Set the ISO to 100.
6. Adjust the shutter speed, but never above 1s.
7. Take a test shot and check the histogram. (A histogram is a statistical graph that represents the brightness levels of a scene captured by the camera.

Above all, practice. Take lots of photos and analyze the results, striving to improve the creative value. Create timelapse moon rises, too.

To get good shots with buildings, landscapes and the like with the moon prominent, AI has this to say about the 200mm lens:

• Composition:The 200mm lens offers a wider field of view than a longer lens, making it easier to incorporate foreground elements like trees, buildings, or landscapes into the image, creating more visually interesting compositions. 

So, it looks to me like the 70-200 is the way to go for what I want to do.

Current lenses:

1. Sigma 14mm f/1.4 DG DN Art
2. Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG DN Art
3. Sigma sports lens maybe? Like this one:

Some ideas to consider, and probably the top of the list for getting deep galaxy type shots, would be a 200 mm lens. This could be used for nature photography as well. So, to that end, a Sigma 70-200 may be the way to go. This is from the Sigma Sports lineup.

Below is the Sigma 70-200 f/1.4 DG DN lens.

DG stands for full frame compatibility

DN indicates designed for mirrorless cameras

• Expressive imaging capabilities with latest optical design
• Dual High-response Linear Actuator (HLA) focus system
• Dust and splash-resistant structure
• Latest OS2 Optical Stabilization up to 7.5 stops
• Inner zoom and inner focusing
• Minimized focus breathing at all focal lengths
• Superior build quality of SIGMA Sports line
• Completes F2.8 DG DN full-frame mirrorless trio

For moon photography and moon timelapse, composition will trump must pure moon shots. This blurb says it all:

Composition:The 200mm lens offers a wider field of view than a longer lens, making it easier to incorporate foreground elements like trees, buildings, or landscapes into the image, creating more visually interesting compositions. 

When you shoot a landscape photo, you’ll probably want everything in focus. As a rule, to get everything in focus, you wangt to use a smaller f/stop, a low ISO, and a good tripod. Here are the particulars:

1. Set exposure to Aperture priority.
2. Set f/stop to middle of the range, which is usually the lens’ sweet spot for sharpness.
3. ISO: 100
4. Use a tripod
5. Shoot in RAW to capture the greatest dynamic range
6. Wait for the best light. NOON IS NOT THE BEST. Dusk and dawn are the best.

That’s pretty much it. Shoot away.

The camera is set up in the back, looking out over the valley below. Sunset is about 8 p.m. and I’ll let the camera run until 10 p.m.

I’ll get a few thousand shots, transfer them to a computer folder, then open that folder with DaVinci Resolve’s incredible editor.

In Resolve’s Media Editor page, you can set Frame Display Mode to Individual or Sequence.

Individual will show every shot, regardless of how many. I had 8000 frames in one timelapse that ran for 12 hours.

Sequence will show a single “stitched together” clip that includes all the individual frames.

Either way, the outcome can be spectacular.

The current setup is only going to run for 3 hours. Doing the math, I’m shooting one frame every 8 seconds, so that’s 7 shots in 56 seconds, which I’ll just round up to one minute.

There are 180 minutes in three hours… so 180 x 7 = 1,260 shots. That’s what I’ll work with, and probably create an Aesop’s Fable from this evening’s shoot.

A new fable from Aesop was just posted to YouTube. I used the timelapse shot from the backyard, of the village lights coming on right after sunset.

If you want to make timelapse work like this, go for it. I’ll be building out more resource materials on this site and adding more info on my YouTube channel as well.