Spillway Milky Way, Part I: A night under the stars at Crab Orchard spillway


It's that time of year again!  The time of year when we can see the Milky Way core in North America.  We can always see the Milky Way since we are in it, but the most photogenic part is only visible up here in the warmer months.

Normally, I travel to dark sky sites in Missouri or SE Illinois, but in keeping with the spirit of stay-at-home for COVID-19, I decided to go to Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge, which is five minutes from my house.  There's a little bit more night pollution there, but I figured I would see what I could get to come out.

My primary tripod broke last week, and I finally ordered a nice, tall, strong tripod.  It was set to arrive Wednesday, so I planned to go then, during the new moon.  The weather mandated that I move the outing to Tuesday night, so I improvised, using hardware in my garage to mount my ballhead to a vintage Travelite tripod that my dad gave me.  It was a cobbled-together rig, but it would work for a night.  Several people mentioned that there was going to be a meteor shower that night, so that would be a nice bonus (spoiler: I saw some meteors, but didn't capture them in the images).

I got to the levee around 10:30pm.  The Milky Way was set to "rise" around 1:30am, but I wanted to try my hand at star trail photography.  So after being entertained by a raccoon scurrying along the rocks below, I set up the camera and the intervalometer (automated shutter-pusher) for 90 minutes of shooting and then laid out on a camping mat.  I watched the sky for a bit, seeing several meteors streak across the sky, and then fell asleep.  This was the result:



I woke up a bit cold, but it was time to move down the levee a bit for the next shot, and the move warmed me up.  I spotted the green reflection in the eyes of a deer as I walked and they soon the green turned to a flash of white as it turned and bounded into the woods.  Around 1:30am I could just start seeing the Milky Way "rise" above the horizon and tried to line it up the best I could with the levee rocks.


Then it was time to head back to the spillway.  I would have loved to go down on the rocks for these pictures, but copious signage warns the public to stay out.  Apparently, the spillway rocks were a popular sunbathing spot for SIU students decades ago, but tragedy resulted in the closure. I am glad that they don't have the whole thing fenced off and that we can still at least enjoy the view. 


I finished the last photo before astronomical twilight, when the sky starts having the slightest hint of light that washes out the stars.  Keep in mind that each photo is really a composite of composites.  The sky is made from 15 x 20-second exposures (and 5 more 20-second exposures with the lens cap on) and then the foreground is made from one or more 3-6 minute photos.  So, each shot takes about an hour to set up and capture all of the frames.

Because there wasn't enough time left for another round of photos, I packed up and drove the car a ways to the turkey woods.  As dawn broke, I found two different turkey roosts and saw dozens of herons and wood ducks.  Then, I headed home and took a nap with Lucy and Laura, who hadn't gotten out of bed yet.


Obviously, this last picture below doesn't compare to the photos above, but I had fun trying to take it using just my 4-year old phone and some photoshop editing.  You can see the tripod propped up on the cement wall taking the final photo displayed above.

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