Night Skies and Lightpainting in Vermont Photo Workshop

This is a paid workshop, please don't RSVP until you have registered at https://lorenphotos.com/product/vt-night-photo-workshop/

Join professional photographer Loren Fisher, as we get away from city lights and explore photographing at night, astrophotography and light painting. We’ll go to remote Vermont locations that offer tremendous views of the sky. I have mastered the technique of light painting: using flashlights to illuminate large objects in the dark. The combination of stars and light painting make for incredible images.

Even if you have never photographed at night, this is will be an exciting exploration of your capabilities, it is much easier than it seems, if you follow the proper steps.

Photos of the night sky can be pretty boring if there isn’t something in the foreground. We’ll make traditional shots with silhouettes but we’ll go beyond that and do light painting to illuminate large foreground objects. I’ll have different flashlights we will use including my big one that can light things up from more than a ¼ mile away.

I’ll show you how to find the Milky Way’s galactic center – the brightest and most colorful section.

One of the trickier things about night photography is focusing your camera, I’ll show you some great methods to make sure you are in focus. We’ll delve into long exposure noise reduction and when it should and shouldn’t be used. You’ll learn how the focal length of your lens affects how long you can leave the shutter open without seeing movement in the stars. We will photograph star trails using multiple exposures and learn how to put them together in Photoshop and the StarStax program.

If we happen to hit a cloudy night, we will still make some fun and exciting photos by doing creative light painting of Vermontish things like a covered bridge, a cemetery, a barn or a pond.

You don’t need a lot of specialized equipment for photographing the stars but you need a camera that makes clean images with ISO higher than 2000. A wide and fast lens is needed, I use a 16-35mm f/2.8 zoom on a full size sensor camera. If you are using a crop sensor, you want at least a 12mm lens or wider. F/2.8 is important, you can get away with f/3.5 but any slower and you won’t be happy with your results. If you don’t have a fast wide angle lens this might be a good time to rent one. You’ll need a sturdy tripod and a remote shutter release, I recommend a wired one. Wireless work but you better have spare batteries! An intervalometer is needed to shoot star trails. Many newer cameras have one built in, but if yours doesn’t, you’ll want to pick one up, it can also serve as your remote shutter release.

We will be based at my art gallery in Woodstock, VT, a quaint New England village named by Conde Nast Traveler as one of the most beautiful towns in America.

We won’t be doing much hiking or walking, you’ll be pretty close to the car the whole time. I recommend wearing hiking boots since we will be out in fields, around ponds and in rough ground in the dark. You’ll receive more clothing suggestions after you register.

Since we will be out late, I won’t have any planned activities during the day but I’ll give you an extensive list of great sites to visit for other photo opportunities.

Local transportation is included in Loren’s 12 passenger Sprinter van. Or you can drive your own car.

Maximum number of participants: 11

For more info and to register go to https://lorenphotos.com/product/vt-night-photo-workshop/

There will be participants who are not members of this Meetup.