Nights of the Comet: Our Photos and Experiences with NEOWISE

Night photography isn’t just our livelihood—it’s also our passion, and our art. As much as we love to teach, we also love to venture into the field and shoot, especially when something special is happening in the sky. Comet NEOWISE certainly met the standard of “something special.”

So a couple of weeks ago, when the comet began appearing among the stars, we knew we wanted to get out to make some photos of it. Lance and I were heading to coastal Maine to run back-to-back moonless workshops. Matt was at home in the beautiful Catskill Mountains of New York. All three of us were in perfect places at perfect times.

NEOWISE is now fading from view, but won’t be fading from memories. Below you’ll find some of the images we created.

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Lance

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A single exposure of Comet NEOWISE and the Monhegan Lighthouse made by covering and uncovering the lens for 3-second intervals. The slowly rotating light has six beams and makes a full rotation once every minute and a half. I first worked on this technique last year during our Cape Cod workshop while photographing Nauset Light in Eastham, Massachusetts. Nauset Light’s beam rotates much faster, and required covering and uncovering the lens a couple of times per second. Chris figured out that 3-second intervals worked well for this one, and I got lucky with this shot by using his timing. · Nikon D750 with a Tamron 15-30mm f/2.8 lens at 20mm. 25 seconds, f/3.2, ISO 6400.

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A dory and the back of the keeper’s house at Monhegan Lighthouse, with Comet NEOWISE between the roof peaks. This is a composite of two exposures––one for the sky and a second longer exposure for the foreground. A smaller aperture was needed for depth of field, which necessitated the higher ISO for the sky shot and a longer exposure for the foreground. This type of subject matter is exactly the kind of thing that I love to shoot, and I would have made the same composition even without the comet. Bonus! · Nikon D750 with a Nikon 24-120mm f/4 lens at 44mm. Sky shot at 10 seconds, f/4.5, ISO 12,800; foreground shot at 70 seconds, f/4.5, ISO 6400.

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Jordan Pond and the famous Bubbles of Acadia National Park, with the comet in the northwestern sky. A composite of different exposures for the foreground and sky. I generally like to get everything in one frame, but the short shutter speeds required to keep the stars and comet sharp combined with the need to stop down for depth of field made this image virtually impossible without compositing. I partially desaturated and added a fair amount of contrast, both to make the image bolder and to minimize any noise issues from the high ISOs. · Nikon D750 with a Tamron 15-30mm f/2.8 lens at 17mm. Sky shot at 25 seconds, f/4, ISO 6400; foreground shot at 270 seconds, f/4, ISO 6400.

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Matt

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It’s been really cloudy here in the Catskills, and when I finally had a clear night, it was cloudy at the horizon. So I really did not get a crack at NEOWISE until the night of the new moon on July 20. I started with my 15mm lens and shot single images. At first I was surprised and a little unhappy about the light pollution—but then I reminded myself that with the new moon everything would have been dark, and the light pollution illuminated the valley below and gave context to the image. · Nikon Z 6 with a Venus Optics Laowa 15mm f/2 FE Zero-D lens. 15 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 6400.

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When I saw the massive galactic core behind me over the mountain, I wanted to shoot for a Milky Way arch with the comet. With 13 images and a really aggressive tilt upward, I was totally surprised the stitch worked. I usually shoot dead level. And I think the S-curve of the mountain to the valley along the bottom works well. I also love the comet arcing in the same curve as the Milky Way. All in all, I was happy with the one night of shooting. Alas, it’s been cloudy ever since! · Nikon Z 6 with a Venus Optics Laowa 15mm f/2 FE Zero-D lens. 13 stitched frames shot at 20 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 6400.

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Chris

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This was my first real chance to focus on photographing the comet. I’d seen it a few times in the nights prior, but had been focused on helping workshop participants so didn’t shoot anything more than a snapshot. But on this night it was just Lance and I out working together at the Monhegan Island Lighthouse in Maine. The evening started off foggy, and the comet wasn’t even on our radar. But suddenly the northern and western skies cleared (that kind of thing can happen in New England), and there it was! I framed the comet between the fog bell and the keeper’s quarters; I light painted the former, and the lighthouse painted the latter. · Nikon D5 with a Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8 lens, light painted with a Luxli Viola. 25 seconds, f/3.5, ISO 6400.

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I’d spotted this scene earlier in the evening, and came back to it as my last stop of the night—once the comet had set low enough. I saw it as a black and white image from conception, partly because the color temperatures were different on the horizon and in the window, and partly because it just felt like an old-time black and white scene. What I didn’t realize, even in the dark, was that the long exposure would reveal in the window someone’s head on the pillow. Why were they sleeping through the comet? · Nikon D5 with a Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. 16 frames shot at 5 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 25,600, stacked in Sequator.

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For a week I knew I wanted to photograph the comet over Jordan Pond in Acadia National Park—one of my happy places. When we got there, the night was perfectly clear, and I got my chance for this pano. · Nikon D5 with a Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. Six stitched frames shot at 15 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 6400.

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My favorite images I’ve seen of the comet are those that incorporate it into a landscape or a wider scene, so that’s mostly what I tried to work on. But I wanted to make just one portrait of NEOWISE. I did so from the northwest shores of Monhegan Island. I liked the blend of colors from the horizon into the deeper blue of the night sky, as well as the deep blues of the Atlantic below—so that became my backdrop for NEOWISE. · Nikon D5 with a Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. 32 frames shot at 5 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 25600, stacked in Sequator.

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Wrapping Up

Now that we’ve shown you our images, we’d love to see yours! Please share your comet photos and stories in the comments or on our Facebook page, or post them on Instagram and tag @nationalparksatnight. Or all three!

Chris Nicholson is a partner and workshop leader with National Parks at Night, and author of Photographing National Parks (Sidelight Books, 2015). Learn more about national parks as photography destinations, subscribe to Chris' free e-newsletter, and more at www.PhotographingNationalParks.com.

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UPCOMING WORKSHOPS FROM NATIONAL PARKS AT NIGHT

Capturing the Comet: How to Photograph the Night Surprise of NEOWISE

The lighthouse on Monhegan Island is an amazing place to shoot at night. But then we saw the comet, and the lighthouse may as well have not even existed. We quickly moved away from the compositions we’d been working so hard on and focused on the celestial visitor instead.

Lance and I are midway through a two-week trip to Maine, where we’re leading two workshops along some of the most beautiful coastline in the U.S. And gosh did we (and the attending night photographers) luck out, because our time here coincided perfectly with the astronomy surprise of the year: Comet NEOWISE.

Photographing the comet quickly became high on the priority list not only for our participants, but also for us. It’s not common to get such an opportunity—once every 7 millennia, for this particular comet—and all of us have been pretty excited by the chase.

We have one more week in Maine, shooting first on Monhegan Island, then moving to Acadia National Park. But before moving on, we wanted to share some tips about photographing the comet, so you can get outdoors too and take advantage of this amazing night-sky event.

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Comet NEOWISE over the Monhegan Island Lighthouse keeper’s quarters, Maine. © 2020 Chris Nicholson. Nikon D5 with a Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8 lens, illuminated by the lighthouse and a Luxli Viola. 25 seconds, f/3.5, ISO 6400.

Finding NEOWISE

First you need to know where in the sky to look for the comet, and when to look there. Fortunately both are pretty easy.

When the comet was first appearing earlier this month, it was doing so in early, early morning—but now (thank goodness) it’s showing up at nautical twilight and hanging around for a few hours before dipping below the horizon. This schedule is much easier for most people to work with.

Where is the comet hanging around? In the north-northwest sky, below the Big Dipper. (See Figure 1. This is for the Northern Hemisphere. Unfortunately our night photography friends south of the equator don’t get to share this show.)

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Figure 1. A rough projection of where in the sky to find Comet NEOWISE this coming week. In general, starting at dusk, look north-northwest, below the Big Dipper. The comet will appear to rotate with the rest of the sky, and will set below the horizon a few hours after first appearing.

Each night the comet will appear slightly more west, as well as slightly higher from the horizon (thereby lasting a little longer before setting). As the evening hours progress, NEOWISE will appear to move toward the horizon with the stars and constellations, eventually setting out of view. Assuming clear skies, you’ll have lots of time to experiment with different strategies and compositions.

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Figure 2. If you’d like help finding the comet in the field, try the Sky Guide app (for iOS and Android), which will pinpoint the comet.

How long will the comet be visible? Astronomers are hypothesizing that we’ll be able to see it until about the end of July. But precision is hard to come by. The good news this week is that the comet is traveling closer to Earth, which should make it larger in the sky; the bad news is that it’s traveling further from the sun, which should mean it won’t be as bright. At some point NEOWISE will cross a threshold where those variables make it even less visible, and then invisible.

Either way, the rest of this week should be the prime opportunity for photography. The comet will be detectable at reasonable hours during very dark skies (i.e., with a new moon). After that, as the comet fades from view, the moon will be growing larger and setting later, eventually obscuring the final acts of the NEOWISE show.

Photographing NEOWISE

As mentioned, we’ve been photographing NEOWISE for a week, so we have some tips we can offer. We hope these will help as you get out this week to capture the comet.

Sharpness

To keep the comet sharp with a long exposure, you’ll want to approach shutter speed the same way as when trying to keep stars or the Milky Way sharp: Use either the 400 Rule, or for more precision, the NPF Rule. In other words, if your stars are sharp, then your comet will be too.

Of course, the comet is by nature a fuzzy-looking thing, so you can get away with a longer shutter speed—perhaps even twice as long as you’d use for a standard sharp-star shot. For example, if a camera/lens combo would allow for a 15-second exposure to freeze the stars, you might be able to shoot for 30 seconds and acceptably freeze the comet. However, then the stars in your image would begin to trail (Figure 3). So it’s probably best to keep shooting for sharp stars, and then everything in your frame will be crisp.

Figure 3. Both of these photos were shot with a 200mm lens—one at 2 seconds, which is compliant with the 400 Rule, the other at 15 seconds, which allowed for shooting at a lower ISO. The comet isn’t that much fuzzier in the latter image, but the stars are trailing. In the former image, despite the higher noise, everything is sharp.

(Another tactic could be the opposite philosophy. Why keep the comet sharp? Maybe photograph a comet trail!)

Lens Choice

The lens you choose will depend on your composition, of course, but it will also depend on your priorities.

If you would like the comet to appear larger in your frame, you’ll want to use a longer lens. However, the longer the lens you use, the shorter your exposure will need to be to keep the comet and stars sharp, which means you’ll need more light to make a good image.

Therefore, if you want to use a longer lens, you’ll probably want to shoot during twilight, when there’s more light in the sky to work with. For example, if shooting with a 200mm lens, the 400 Rule dictates a maximum of 2 seconds for the shutter speed before stars and the comet begin to trail. At twilight with an f/2.8 lens you can shoot for 2 seconds at ISO 3200 or 6400, but after twilight you would need an ISO of 64,000. So, yeah, best to save those telephotos for twilight.

Once you’re into astronomical twilight and beyond, stick with shorter lenses. The comet will appear smaller in your frame, but with creativity you can make the image work (Figure 4). Just put the comet somewhere in the scene where it will be noticeable and will complement the composition. In other words, you’re essentially making an environmental portrait of NEOWISE. Most of the good comet photos I’ve seen were made this way.

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Figure 4. Comet NEOWISE over the Pemaquid Point Lighthouse, Maine. © 2020 Lance Keimig. Nikon D750 with a Sigma 24mm f/1.4 Art lens. 13 seconds, f/4, ISO 6400.

Compositing

You could also use both types of lenses to make a composite image. You could shoot a big comet with a long lens earlier in the evening, the foreground and a big sky with a short lens later in the evening, and blend them together in post-production.

This approach is not something I favor either for my artistic process or when looking at others’ artwork—I just don’t like unnatural proportions of natural objects (i.e., a giant moon over a wide-angle alpine landscape). But such a strategy is possible, so it’s prudent to mention here. If you like that style, or you’d like to try that style, the comet is a good subject for it.

Compiling Light

Just like with stars, there are other approaches to keeping the comet sharp, and they involve some way of “stacking” the available light to create a low-noise image in a high-ISO situation. This might allow you to use that longer lens at a lower ISO, or to just get a cleaner final photograph.

1. Stack multiple exposures of the same sky scene using a program such as Starry Landscape Stacker for Mac or Sequator for PC. (See our blog post “Processing Star Point Images … .” This works great for creating crisp, low-noise photos of stars, and works well with a comet too. On the other hand, it means more work both in the field and at the computer.

2. Use a sky-tracking device, such those made by SkyWatcher and Move Shoot Move (Figure 5). These mount to your tripod and slowly rotate the camera to counteract the rotation of the earth, which allows you to shoot the night sky with longer exposures and lower ISOs. This method also requires a little more field work, as well as some extra post-production time if you want to mask in a sharp foreground.

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Figure 5. The Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer (left) and Move Shoot Move Portable Star Tracker (right) are two gear options that allow you to shoot longer exposures of moving stars (and comets).

White Balance

The approach to white balance is not much different than it would be photographing any other night. Just shoot how you normally would for a given environment. Here are a couple of resources from our blog to help you decide:

• “How to Choose the Right White Balance for Night Skies”

• “Making the Move to Manual White Balance”

Mind the Moon

As mentioned previously, the moon is about to crash the comet party. This means two things:

1. In the nights after the Monday new moon, a thin crescent will be low in the sky during twilight, which might sound tempting for including it in a composition with NEOWISE. However, the moon rises in the east, more than 100 compass degrees away from the comet. So you’re not likely to get them in the same frame in a good composition. (Unless you shoot a pano. Hmm.)

2. After a few nights (Friday, where we are), the moon will still be in the sky after astronomical twilight is over. It will be at 20 percent illumination that night, and getting brighter, and setting later, on each successive night. Concurrently, the comet will be traveling further from the sun and from Earth. All of these factors together mean that NEOWISE will grow fainter each night.

Find a Foreground

Shooting a comet certainly has a wow factor—just like shooting the Milky Way, or a meteor shower, or a moon rise, etc. But all of those are better when set in the context of a composition that includes other elements.

So rather than just pointing your camera at the sky, remember to look for an interesting foreground, and set the comet behind it. A good rule of thumb is that if the composition isn’t interesting without the comet, then it won’t be a great photo even with the comet.

Look for a lighthouse, or a building, or a shoreline, or a sea stack, or a train trestle, or a rock formation, or mountain road, or an old barn, etc. Make a good composition with the comet as an important element alongside whatever else, and you’re on your way to artistic greatness.

Wrapping Up

Of course, as always, we would love to see your images of Comet NEOWISE. Share them in the comments section or on our Facebook page. (To view a bunch of great images our workshop alumni and others have already shared, see this post.)

Chris Nicholson is a partner and workshop leader with National Parks at Night, and author of Photographing National Parks (Sidelight Books, 2015). Learn more about national parks as photography destinations, subscribe to Chris' free e-newsletter, and more at www.PhotographingNationalParks.com.

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UPCOMING WORKSHOPS FROM NATIONAL PARKS AT NIGHT

That’s a Wrap: Recapping Our Livestream Night Photography Shoot in Pittsburgh

Greetings from Pittsburgh!

I’ve spent the last week here, visiting family, but also upping my night photography portfolio of this beautiful place. Pittsburgh has all the classic elements that make for a great urban night photography experience: rivers surrounding a downtown skyline, tons of iconic bridges, and plenty of vantage points along the riverfront or up in the hills to compose multiple interpretations of this scenic city.

I was having so much fun photographing Pittsburgh that I wanted to share it with anyone else who wanted to come—virtually, anyway. So this past Wednesday, for the first time ever, we did a live night shoot, livestreamed on Instagram. It ended up being an online night photography party!

The Shoot

I set up at one of the perfect viewpoints of Pittsburgh: Allegheny Landing, between the Roberto Clemente and Andy Warhol bridges. We livestreamed during twilight, the blue hour, which is the best time to balance the city lights with the night sky in one exposure. Big shout out to all of you who joined in, asked questions and enjoyed the shoot. For those who missed it, you can watch it here:

The Photos

Of course, that was just the shoot. Post-processing is half of the photographic process, and that’s the half I’ve been doing in the two days since. So now, with that done, I’m checking in to share the three photos I shot during the livestream, as well as a couple of others from my trip to hopefully inspire you to seize the twilight in your city!

The Movement

I shot my first frame about 10 to 15 minutes into civil twilight. The city lights and sky perfectly matched in terms of exposure. However, I wanted more movement in the clouds and water, so I waited another 10 minutes. Twilight illumination changes quickly—in that 10 minutes I lost more than 3 stops of light. Then I was able to get to a 30-second exposure, which gave me smoother reflections and a better sky. However, some of the brighter city lights were blowing out, so I took an additional shot at 1/2 second to blend in post.

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Fujifilm X-T2 with a Fujifilm 8-16mm f/2.8 lens. Two blended frames shot at 1/2 and 30 seconds, f/16, ISO 200.

The Drama

The next goal was to start looking for different angles to shoot the bridge. I loved the drama of shooting under the bridge, so that’s what I tackled first. This proved to be a fairly easy shot to pull off, but I still needed two frames: a base exposure at 30 seconds and 5-second exposure for maintaining the brightest highlights.

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Fujifilm X-T2 with a Fujifilm 8-16mm f/2.8 lens. Two blended frames shot at 5 and 30 seconds, f/16, ISO 200.

The Detail

For the last bridge shot, I got up on the deck and looked for a detail to home in on. I kept things simple and looked for even illumination that didn’t include a large swath of the sky (which was recording as just black at that point).

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Fujifilm X-T2 with a Fujifilm 90mm f/2 lens. 2 seconds, f/6.4, ISO 400.

The Pano

I love shooting Pittsburgh at night, so I got out for a couple of other evenings too. One of my favorite photos from the trip was this five-image panorama I shot from a high vantage point that looks directly at Point State Park and the confluence of the three rivers (the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio). I shot this during the end of civil twilight and had to blend to maintain a few of the brightest highlights.

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Fujifilm X-T2 with a Fujifilm 90mm f/2 lens. Five stitched frames shot at 4 seconds, f/13, ISO 200.

The Rotunda

I finally own a wide enough lens (the Fujifilm 8-16mm, which is a 12-24mm full-frame equivalent) to do justice to The Pennsylvanian, one of the most famous rotundas in the U.S. Built at the turn of the 20th century, The Pennsylvanian is one of the finest examples of Beaux-Arts architecture. It served as a sheltered turning space for carriages transporting people to and from the nearby train station.

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Fujifilm X-T2 with a Fujifilm 8-16mm f/2.8 lens. 2 seconds, f/10, ISO 400.

Wrapping Up

Let us know in the comments what you thought of the live shoot. The response so far has been great and we hope to soon share similar experiences. Make sure you are following us on Instagram—we typically do a live conservation every Wednesday at 8 p.m., and of course we’re always posting new images from our night adventures!

Gabriel Biderman is a partner and workshop leader with National Parks at Night. He is a Brooklyn-based fine art and travel photographer, and author of Night Photography: From Snapshots to Great Shots (Peachpit, 2014). During the daytime hours you'll often find Gabe at one of many photo events around the world working for B&H Photo’s road marketing team. See his portfolio and workshop lineup at www.ruinism.com.

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UPCOMING WORKSHOPS FROM NATIONAL PARKS AT NIGHT