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Garth Battista
Halcottsville, New York
06/06/2020
10:30 pm

Equipment Details:

Sony a6000
Sigma DC DN 16mm lens
See description for Exif details

Post-processing Details:

Stacked in Sequator
Blended in Photoshop

Image Details:

Fireflies and the full moon.
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This image is a blend: the camera stayed in one place and took two sequences of the exact same frame, one right after the other. The fireflies were shot from 9:30 till 10:15 before the moon rose above the trees. Fireflies need a long exposure and a high ISO / open aperture, so f/2.8, ISO 500, 6 seconds. I shot 350 of those frames and stacked them in Sequator.
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The moon is very bright so if you want to see any surface details you need to set your exposure relatively low: I shot 80 frames, one every 2½ minutes between 10:30 and 2:00, at f/9, ISO 125, 1/80 second shutter speed. Those images got stacked in Sequator.
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The two stacks were blended ("lighten mode") in Photoshop. I then cropped to about one-third the original width so you can see the fireflies more closely and the moon wouldn't entirely lose its detail.
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I'm happy with how this turned out and would like to try it with a longer lens.
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This was shot last night in a field behind our house in the Catskill Mountains. Near as I can tell, it is one of the world's greatest firefly hotspots. 🙂