Removing the Noise

 So! Noise!

One of the biggest problems I have with my night/astro-photography is noise.
I shoot at around 800 ISO to keep the amount of noise I'm afflicted by to a minimum whilst still maximising the amount of light my camera(A Nikon D90) is picking up.

I won't go into the details really. I'm only using readily available plugins and bits and bobs but I thought I'd post some comparison shots of older photos I have taken where I have always regretted the amount of noise in, next to images with some noise reduction used.

It was difficult to tweak the noise however without tweaking a few other things which is why you may notice some slightly more drastic differences in the images.

In some cases I think the noise reduction I've done  is still not quite enough, I'm not sure.

If you know any anti-noise techniques and would like to share them please do. Either leave a comment below or feel free to contact me. I'd be very interested.

A Sunset over Studland

A quick trip over the Sandbanks ferry today to try out some sunset photography down on Studland beach where I knew there to be an... arrangement? Of concrete blocks that form what I imagine is meant to be a groyne. (It's the only one there though)

It could be an old sea defence, I don't know but I thought it would form a useful leading-line in a landscape shot and hoped the "partial cloud" forecast might provide an interesting sky.

Here are the shots:

Fairylights and the Devil's Sleeping Hat

Tonight I spent the evening at a new location known as Agglestone Rock.

In local myth it's apparently known as the Devil's Nightcap due to a story that involves the Devil tossing his nightcap towards Corfe Castle and missing. (Because the Devil can never succeed right?)

Apparently it toppled at somepoint and was previously known as the Devil's Anvil, for resembling... an anvil I guess.

I don't think there is a standing stone anywhere in the UK that doesn't have a story involving a devil of some sort.

The site itself is pretty easy to access, a fifteen minute walk I'd guess. The only slightly worrying part is that you have to walk right in front of a golf hole. Thankfully I was passing at night time but in the daytime you'd run the risk of dodging golf-balls, there's another way round that I took unintentionally thankfully.

Anyway my primary goal of the evening was not to scout Agglestone as a location, instead, it was to trial a new bit of lighting I bought recently. Some battery powered fairy-lights. The plan being that I could spin them about and create some man-made spirals to mirror the stars that will trail above.

Feel free to judge for yourself on how that worked out.

Return to Winspit

Once more a clear night has... dusked, so with Windspit quarry still fresh in my mind I had to plan a revisit.

This time the weather would be a little windy, which I took to be northerly so I was hoping to be shielded by the cliffs, also the moon would not raise until the shortly before dawn so I was expecting a truly dark evening.

This time I snagged a couple of quick noisey shots of the sight you see as you turn into the quarry.

This time I wanted to put a bit more focus on the caves, some of them are quite large but getting a good night-sky angle from inside one with sufficiently interesting detail in the foreground and a busy enough scape of stars in the background was quite difficult.

Due to the volume of images and some animations please click the following link to read further...

A Hamworthy Sunset

This evening was spent down on Hamworthy beach where I could experiment on sunset photography.
Sadly we arrived a bit late so the sun had already set but there was still colour in the sky so I went out of my way to make use of it.

I'm still not great at finding a way to do landscape photography and with the light failing on me I decided i'd stick to more familiar ground and with nothing I could think of to shoot I decided I'd make something. SO, scrabbling around in the wet and the dark I built myself a few stone monoliths to use as foreground.

I liked the way the stars bokeh'd and tried to line them up above my little stone creations.

When headed back to the car it was too tempting not to make use of the jetty again for a couple of shots with a clear sky, quickly, before I had to go home and get some much needed sleep.

A moon-lit evening at Winspit Quarry

So, another new amazing location found on the Jurassic Coast, this one is Winspit Quarry.
On this trip I was joined by two fellow photographers, Chris and Shaun. (Who found and suggested this location and joined me on two recent trips.)

It's a fairly short walk from Worth Matravers and not quite where we expected after having spent quite a while reviewing google maps.
When we hit this sign(left), we turned left as a nearly full moon rose(That's the moon not the sun), which does lead down to the water but was not much use to us. We couldn't find any of the apparent ruined structures that could be seen from the satellite imagery, only some slightly treacherous looking climbs down to the rocks.


So, failing there and deciding not to explore the beach below due to the tide being in and the rocks being uneven and slippery we tried turning right at the sign. Where very shortly after we were greeted by the most amazing sight!


An opening in the cliff side to a  great hollow filled with ruins and lined with caves all lit by the right moon light. There was so much potential we didn't know where/how to start.

Regrettably I didn't get a shot as we arrived to show what we saw but it probably wouldn't be that impressive as a photo it just would've been nice too have to document the occasion.
Here is a panoramic shot of the area though .

Due to the volume of images and the inclusion of some animations I've broken this post up so please click the link to read further:

Hamworthy and the fog

Tonight I joined a colleague from the office to a local site called Hamworthy in Poole.
The weather wasn't going to be good. All reports were saying that it would be cloudy until it was dark and then it would be foggy so we weren't really intending to do anything other than scout out the location for future use and to work out how dark the skies were, we weren't expecting to come away with any decent shots at all really.

As you can see the site is mostly a heath-land sat on a cliff edge, over looking Poole harbour. It's quite a nice spot, worth revisiting on a clear night for a few reasons but it wasn't until we headed back to the car that we found what we'd end up spending the rest of the night shooting.

A jetty.
The jetty itself was a T-shape, one wide, long boardwalk leading up to two smaller ones on the left and right.
The fog started rolling in and the water was calm and still so the boats reflected well and the nearby docks and harbours lit the fog quite dramatically.

Naturally the glowsticks were put to work!

All in all it's an amazing spot, well worth a revisit on both a clear night and a dramatic sunset.
Expect to see more from here.

Until then though here is one of my favourite shots from the trip.
The chap at the end there taking his own photographs is Shaun, who joined me and suggested the location.