Highway to Heaven?

[PhotoByTrace]

The result of a night playing at my favourite rest-stop lookout. One of the few places I could pretty much work out of the back of my car without needing to carry my gear. It took some experimenting to work out the timing and ISO for the car trails but was pretty pleased in the end.



A blend of two images.
The first image was as the car was climbing the range but was still out of the frame with just the headlights highlighting the treeline with the milky way in the sky beyond the treeline. 20secs ISO2500 14mm f/2.8



The second image was as the car was passing to get just the light trails. I needed to drop the ISO to ensure they weren't overexposed. 20secs ISO400 14mm f/2.8



I opened both layers in photoshop and set the blending mode of the top layer to screen which allowed the lighter pixels from below to show through.



From there I made some curves adjustments to the mid-tones, and did a little burning and dodging and a crop to arrive at the final image as seen above.

Feedback and comments welcomed.

[TonyW]

That's well done and thanks for your description of the method.

[Rebel]

I love it Trace

A well thought out and executed image, thanks for sharing!

[Loose Canon]

Outstanding Trace.

[Shadowman]

Looks like quite the location. Nicely done on the exposures.

[Barbara Ponder]

Nice images and technique, thanks for sharing.

[bnnrcn]

Great image Trace Thanks also for explaining how you created the image.

[IzzieK]

Excellent shot,Trace....I love this kind of scene...

[PhotoByTrace]

Thanks all! Glad you enjoyed the photo or the breakdown of taking it.

Trust me when I say I could have added quite a few "bloopers" as I worked out what settings were going to work and trying to gauge how fast or slow a vehicle was going to judge when I should start the exposure. It was fun but thank goodness for digital as a medium with its instant feedback on exposures and almost zero cost associated with each click

This road is not well travelled at night, at one point I waited twenty minutes for the next vehicle to come along to experiment with; I ended up calling it a night once the milky way had rotated beyond this vantage point. Normally when I shoot at this location it is in the opposite direction; outwards from the lookout, rather than towards the road and the curve.

These are also from that lookout, but to the east rather than the south-west. It provides lots of different perspectives at different times of the year (and day/night).

[IzzieK]

All beautiful Trace...you got an artistic eye. When I grow up....

[ionian]

It's images like this that I dream of taking - truly stunning. I appreciate bing able to read about the processes needed to produce such a picture as well, many thanks for sharing!

[DanK]

very nice, and thanks very much for posting your method.