Photographing the Milky Way: tips and tricks

When you take pictures of the Milky Way, impressive pictures can be created. However, this is not possible without prior knowledge. We show you what is important if you want to take pictures of our galaxy at night.

Requirements for taking pictures of the Milky Way

Regardless of your camera equipment, some requirements must be met in order to photograph the Milky Way.

• The most important thing is that you are in the darkest possible environment. The light that the stars emit is very weak and is easily outshone by other light sources.
• If you live in a larger city, you should drive a few kilometers out into the country. In cities, light pollution is so great that at most a few individual stars would be visible.
• The weather is also important. Only on a clear, cloudless night do you get a clear view of the Milky Way.
• If possible, photograph the stars at new moon. Then the surroundings are even darker and the stars stand out better.

You need this equipment

You don't have to have the most expensive camera to take good pictures of the Milky Way. However, it is very important that you can make all settings manually.

• If you use a camera with interchangeable lenses, you should use a lens that is as wide-angled and bright as possible. As a rough guide: focal lengths below 20 mm and an aperture of f / 2.8 or lower are ideal.
• You also need a tripod on which the camera stands securely. Due to the long exposure time, there are restlessness or streaks that could be triggered by your movement.
• Make sure that the batteries of your camera are sufficiently charged. Especially on cold nights, the performance drops considerably. In any case, you should have a spare battery with you.

Night photography settings

The settings on the camera are made entirely manually. The automatic modes do not give good results in the dark.

• Set the lens to the smallest possible focal length and open the aperture as far as possible.
• The exposure time should not be longer than 20-25 seconds. Because of the earth's rotation, the stars no longer appear as dots, but as small lines.
• You ultimately control the exposure of your image via the ISO value. To keep the noise behavior low, you should set the ISO as low as possible. Usually you need a value of ISO 1600 - 3200.