My First (Real) Astrophotography Attempt

Last week during a trip to Yosemite for 2 nights, I had a chance to try out my new camera for some night sky photography for the first time.

I use a Sony a6100 so this isn't a full-frame camera; with a crop sensor like this I'm limited in what I can do, but I still got some good shots and had a good time! The lens for these was a Tamron 20mm f/2.8 prime lens (I'm working on a budget here).

These were all taken from Glacier Point above the Yosemite valley, at approximately 7200 feet.

I tried to stick to an under 8-second exposure to minimize star trails, but I did go up to 30 seconds on some while I was experimenting and playing around.

This was my first real attempt at photography like this; while I have tried before I didn't have the right equipment (tripod, remote shutter release, etc). Here's a result from my other attempt versus now. I'm pretty proud of the difference!

My first attempt in 2015 on a Canon T3i

Glacier Point is one my favorite places in the world that I've seen stars from and it was a lot of fun shooting these! Here are a few more photos from the trip to check out:

Next step: trying my hand at removing airplane trails

One bonus photo from the end of the trip!