Delta II Launch from Manhattan Beach
November 6th, 2010, 12:31am by Jake
Still wish Derrick & Montana had gotten to see a rocket launch up close. Hopefully they each enjoy this long-exposure shot a few blocks from home. Turns out I didn’t need 142 second exposure or a 10mm lens– 100 seconds with a 20mm would’ve worked quite well. Nevertheless, this came out well, showing the arc clearly while the solid rocket motors burned bright, fading away as it sailed higher into the whiter clouds with less fuel burning.
Was actually down there Monday & Tuesday nights as well, only to see each launch get scrubbed with less than a minute to go. Worked better tonight!
November 6th, 2010 at 12:10 pm
Cool, especially since you only got one shot at shooting the launch. How did you decide on 142 seconds? Did you do a couple of test shots? That must have been boring!
November 6th, 2010 at 12:21 pm
I was planning on just doing 30 seconds, as I thought the rocket would, well, rocket across the sky. But met another shutterbug who showed me a shot he had, 82 seconds on a 20mm, and I realized that 30 was WAY too short. I had plenty of test shots at 30 seconds, so I just adjusted the ISO from 800 to 200 and figures I was good for a couple minutes. 20mm would’ve been a better focal length, not that it mattered– plenty of room to crop, and got rid of most of the noise associated with the tight crop during post.
November 7th, 2010 at 8:37 am
Nice! So that’s what it would’ve looked like ;). Still have fond memories of dinner at the Hitching Post though!
November 9th, 2010 at 4:46 pm
Is this one of yours?
November 9th, 2010 at 4:46 pm
Website didn’t show up in other e-mail
http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/11/09/california.contrails/index.html
November 9th, 2010 at 10:51 pm
Crazy stuff. I know as much as you.