Milky Way Core over the Gold Fork River

Donnelly, Idaho

August 20, 201318 mm: ISO 6400: f/3.5: 30 secs.

Aaron King from Photog Adventures joined me in Idaho to shoot the total eclipse so I had to take advantage of the opportunity for some coaching for my first attempt at shooting the milky way core.

We had some time after the sunset to go scout out and prep our location.  One of my favorite places to shoot in the Cascade/Donnelly area is the peaceful river bends off the road to Gold Fork Hot Springs just south of Donnelly.

The Photopills app was invaluable as we were surprised to learn the milky way wouldn’t be exactly where we thought and the handful of location ideas I had did not line up correctly with the core.  We ended up finding a bridge to set up on where the core was going to line up right over the river.

This shot was tough for me because I really don’t have the right equipment for shooting astrophotography.  You really want a good wide angle lens that is also fast.  An aperture of 2.8 or lower is definitely preferred.  Unfortunately, the fastest I have at a wide angle is f.3.5.  Nevertheless, I was pretty happy with the effort on this for my first ever shot of the milky way. I can’t thank Aaron enough for helping me  out.

Gear Used:

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