So what’s a photo workshop like on a dark night in Bodie in late July? Here’s a preview…
Milky Way over Bodie during a night photography workshop in June 2013.
This image taken around 12:15 am on June 15 shows a Milky Way position roughly equivalent to 10 pm on July 19. Note that the bright galactic center is a little east of due south.
Milky Way position in Bodie night photo workshop at the end of nautical twilight 9:24 pm.
The Milky Way will tilt up and rise towards midnight, like this shot facing south down Main Street from the north end of town.
Milky Way over Main Street, Bodie
By the time we have to pack up for the required 1 am departure, the Milky Way will be nearly vertical and dropping slightly in the sky. Note the galactic center of the Milky Way now west of due south. You can also see in the sky chart below that there will be a few minor meteor showers lightly active on this date, so we may get lucky and pick up a meteor or two.
Milky Way position in Bodie near the end of a night photo workshop, 12:45 am.
So the bottom line is: plan ahead to capture your landscape orientation and east to southeast compositions from 9:20 to 11 or so, more vertical portrait orientation compositions will evolve with the Milky Way getting increasingly vertical from 11 to 12:45.
Once we get the workshop set up, I’ll forward a list of recommended things to bring, everything from clothing to camera gear to smartphone apps. One app helps with depth of field, which is handy since few of us have hyperfocal charts memorized for apertures like f/2.8 or even f/1.4 which we may want to use on a dark, moonless night. Another predicts possible sightings of satellites and the Space Station, specifically when the solar panels are likely to be oriented to cause a flash and streak in the sky as seen from our position on the earth. Most people mistake those “flares” as being meteors. Here’s one we predicted and caught over the Bodie firehouse, from an Iridium communications satellite:
Iridium Flare: sunlight reflecting off of the solar panels of an Iridium communications satellite.
There’s a lot we can do with light painting as well.
Light painting the Bodie’s 1937 Chevy with colored lights, flashlights, and “el wire”.
This star trails shot was created by taking many 30 second shots and “stacking” them. For many reasons we’ll cover, it’s best achieved via multiple stacked shots.
Star Trails Over Bodie Church
We’ll have some “golden hour” time in town as well, hopefully as nice as this!
Golden hour light in Bodie
Wild iris may still be blooming in Bodie in mid to late July.
Wild Iris and firehouse at sunset, Bodie State Historic Park
We’ll have lots of time to access interiors the next morning as well.
Bodie’s Boone General Store and Warehouse
Bodie’s Boone General Store and Warehouse
As with the night photography, Bodie experience, planning, organization and efficiency are the keys to making best use of the limited available time when you have special access in Bodie.
For more Bodie photos you may browse more of my work on sites such as Flickr and Google+:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/
https://plus.google.com/
https://plus.google.