Star Trails and Milkyway in Singapore
General notes on my star trails images taken in Singapore:
1. The actual geographic north pole is around 1.3 degrees above horizon and geographic south pole is around -1.3 degrees below horizon. So if the "radiant point" is high above the horizon, it indicates that I have shifted the original pole position probably to make the star trails effect looks better. In reality, being located near the equator, almost all the stars we see in the night sky are non-circumpolar. So we can only see half the celestial dome at all times.
2. Almost all the dark sites in Singapore don't offer interesting foreground. So you can assume all my star trails and milky way images taken in Singapore are composites unless indicated otherwise. Which means the foreground of my image and the star trails or milkyway were taken in different locations and then blended together in post processing.
3. Stars do have colors, including those colors we can't see with our naked eyes. The color of a star indicates its temperature with blue being the hottest and red being the coldest. The color of those stars you see in my images were already recorded in the raw files. I merely enhanced its color in post processing and sometimes i may over-saturate it deliberately to make my image looks colorful.
4. You will be able to figure out the direction of stars movement as seen from Earth, based on the direction I was facing, from my images. If I'm facing North, the stars will appear to move in an anti-clockwise direction and if I'm facing South, the stars will appear to move in a clockwise direction.
5. My star trails images are not meant for the purists. Please view them as a creative art and do not try to navigate around with them.
6. Can we even see stars in Singapore? YES! Can we shoot nice star trails images in Singapore? YES if you try hard enough! Can we shoot milky way in Singapore? YES! The below timelapse was filmed on 24 November 2013 morning with a moonlight illumination of around 60%. If you think you can't shoot star trails with the presence of moon in a light polluted city, click on the link below and think again :) The moon light interference is visible at the top near the end of the clip.
https://vimeo.com/80181941
https://vimeo.com/80181941
