I am by no means an expert on the night sky, but I have many fond memories of sleeping under the stars and learning the constellations on hiking and canoeing trips over the years.

When choosing lenses for my new camera, I wanted to find one which would allow me to take pictures of the night sky. I finally managed to take some time on a relatively clear, cool and mosquito-less night to test it out.

To really enjoy this post I strongly recommend that you view these pictures on a decent screen in a dark room. In fact Right Click > Open Image in New Tab, may be the only way to see the pictures properly.

A blue tinge to the sky around 11pm:

Draco, the Big Dipper, and Little Dipper (with Polaris – the North Star):

Hercules, the Corona Borealis (my favourite constellation) and Bootes (with Arcturus):

A nice view of the summer triangle with the constellations Lyra (with Vega), Cygnus (with Deneb) and Aquila (with Altair). Also Draco’s head at the top of the picture, and Delphinus and the bottom:

A 10 minute exposure facing south. I still have lots to learn to get nice pictures with star trails.

Overall I was quite happy with my first outing. The sky was for from being very dark due to the time of year, light cloud cover, and the fact that the moon was rising over a ridge in my area shortly after midnight. I look forward to taking more pictures on darker nights.

For anyone interested in the technical details here is the equipment I used. Nothing too elaborate.

Camera: Fuji X-E1, Lens: manual focus Rokinon 12mm, f/2.0, tripod, shutter cable release.

Most of the pictures were taken at f/2.0, ISO 640 with exposure times between 3 and 4 seconds.