I have been wanting to do a night shoot at the Belle Point Ranch with the iconic Budweiser Silo for many years and this past month everything appeared to be working out for me to be able to do the shoot I had in mind, photographing the Milky Way behind the silo.
I organized the photo shoot for the Photographic Alliance of Fort Smith and contacted the owners explaining what I was wanting to do, and the special needs of being able to turn off lights at the location in order to make the shot work.
Planning a Milky Way Shoot
Making a great photograph the Milky Way is is about 70% planning, 20% luck, and 10% skill.
The Milky Way
The full galactic core is only visible during certain months, at certain locations. You can see the rest of The Milky Way throughout the year, but for truly eye-popping results it’s the galactic core that you’ll be hunting for.
Location
Finding a good location is one of the most important parts of creating a good Milky Way photo. There are many factors to take into consideration.
- Is the location accessible late at night?
- Do you have permission to be there?
- Do you have a good foreground subject?
- Are there lights that will interfere with the shot?
- Can you shoot towards the southern sky?
- When will you be able to see the Milky Way?
- When will there be no moon?
- Will the sky be clear?
- Do I have to get up early the next morning?
There are numerous apps for smartphone to help in planning a Milky Way shoot, the one that I used for this photo shoot was Sun Surveyor which is available for I phone or Android.
Sun Surveyor
Sun Surveyor provides powerful tools to plan, predict, visualize and interact with the sun and moon – all wrapped in an easy to use interface.
- Live View – Augmented reality using the device’s camera to put you in the center of a sun and moon path simulator.
- Interactive Map – Visual sun and moon overlays, distance and elevation calculations, shadows.
- Street View – Explore and plan near and far with 360° interactive panoramas.
- 3D Compass – Get your bearings instantly with a unique perspective.
Clear Sky Chart
I use Clear Sky Chart to help in determining whether it will be good viewing of the Milky Way, it pulls weather data and shows expected cloud cover, transparency, seeing, and darkness for thousands of locations.
Dark Site Finder
Dark Site Finder is another tool to help determine dark areas based upon light pollution. I works as an overlay of Google Maps and you can zoom in on a location.
http://darksitefinder.com/maps/world.html
The Results
Great Places for Great Photos
Let me help you to find a great location for your next photography adventure. I will list many lesser-known destinations, as well as the famous "Icon Locations" for photography. I will provide photos (Lots of Photos), location information, consisting of what there is to photograph as well as other information about the destination. I will give costs, maps, directions, contact information, and other essential information for a successful photo trip. I will only post for locations that I have personally photographed to ensure a quality guide to great locations for photography. If you know of great places that are not posted, please send me the details, I may just decide that is a place I need to go!
Greg Disch is a freelance photographer located in Arkansas. Greg specializes in nature, scenic, wildlife, and other outdoor subjects in Arkansas and other areas of the country. Most of the images on this site are available for sale as prints, personal use, or rights managed stock photos.
Greg offers both classroom instruction and in the field hands on photographic workshops. Classroom sessions are normally held in Fort Smith Arkansas, but arrangements can be made to bring a class to your group.
All classes and workshops have small class sizes designed to provide an optimum student to instructor ratio, where you can get the personal attention, you need. Most classes and workshops are limited to a maximum of six participants and will be held with a minimum of only two.
If you are looking for a wonderful opportunity to get personal individual instruction, I do private workshops and classes at a location of your choice, whether doing a location photo shoot, coming to your home or business, traveling across the country on a road trip, or at my classroom. This is a fantastic way to learn digital workflow and be sure that your computer equipment is properly configured for optimum performance.
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