Leveled to horizon, slight crop, color/contrast/vibrance enhancement.

The naked eye does not see what the camera sees. We see in real time and a camera sensor keeps on collecting light data until the image is washed out from overexposure. On this shot I was wanting to capture light data as much as possible without blowing it out. So I opened this first time use 24mm prime lens wide open at f1.4 and a crazy high ISO of 6400 at 20 seconds of exposure time. Go Big or Go Home! attitude. The RAW image was on the verge of blowing out since the Sony a7s is known for its excellent low light performance.

As I got into processing the image on my laptop, it surprised me how much color data was collected. Red and Green airglow galore! Reflection of the galactic core off of the lake bed surface, surprised me! Dust lanes and dark nebula, Check! Rho Ophiuchi, got it! Light pollution ( check! ) from St. George, UT, a decent sized city 200 miles SSW of my location, several aircraft trails ( grrrr! ) and a number of overhead passing satellites..all of which I left in the image instead of cloning them out. The aircraft traffic was horrendous the entire evening and by 2AM I started waiting for chances of "in between planes" images. Didn't happen. Made the most of it. Same with the constant wind and dust blowing at me all night...felt at times like a hair dryer with baby powder mixed in with the hot air. My eyes were filled with clay dust and extremely red all day Saturday. Health risks are an integral part of this endeavor. All the night critters found in the Southwest US deserts plus the weather. I love it!