100+ Mpix Milky Way landscape

[MartinFransson]

This image is for a project I do at the Swedish national park of Store Mosse for the County Administrative Board. They hired me to take photos of the park for some new information material (signs) and as a side project they wanted to add a shot of the Milky Way above the mire. So ladies and gentlemen, here it is... my first ever paid astro photo shoot!

It is a stitched panorama of the Milky Way over Store Mosse National Park. This large mire is southern Sweden’s most original biotope and largest marsh area.

The stitched panorama image is composed from 24 shots with my Canon 6D and Sigma 50/1.4 lens. Each image is 6 seconds at f/2.2 and ISO 6400 except for the foreground shots which are 30 seconds at f/2.5.
Finished image size is over 100 Mpix and the plan is to have it printed very large and placed by the start of one of the walking paths, maybe with some additional info on light pollution (yay, let the people know!)

It was a wonderful night, although the mist picked up some LP from nearby cities as you can see from the orange glow by the horizon. I stayed out until 1:30 am, had a 1,5 hour drive home, went to bed and got up for work less than 3 hours later. Not my best day at work

[wimvb]

Great image! And congratulations on the assignment.

[cuivenion]

Amazing! Would love to see the full size image one day.

[MartinB]

Absolutely gorgeous image.  Well done.  How did you put together the mosaic?

[MartinFransson]

Thank you! I just stuffed them into Image Composite Editor and fiddled a bit with the projection settings. Made a separate round with the foreground shots and blended in Photoshop. 

[MartinB]

Downloading ICE!  Do you run any lens corrections beforehand?

[cuivenion]

I've used ICE for lunar mosiacs before, it's pretty good.

[MartinFransson]

6 hours ago, MartinB said:

Downloading ICE!  Do you run any lens corrections beforehand?

Yes, in Lightroom. Also do rough adjustments there. 

[MartinB]

Thanks Martin