Stacking advice from a commenter fixed my Milky Way shots

I posted a single 30 second exposure last month and someone pointed out my star trails were getting soft at the edges. They said I needed to stack multiple shorter frames instead of relying on one long shot. So I tried 12 frames at 15 seconds each with my tracking mount near Joshua Tree and the difference was night and day. Anyone else have a random forum critique that ended up improving their photos more than any tutorial?

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brookebailey29d ago

Did you try dithering between frames too, or just let the tracker run straight? I once stacked a bunch of shots and forgot my intervalometer was on the wrong setting, so all 15 frames were actually taken 2 minutes apart, and I ended up with these weird star arcs that looked kinda cool but totally ruined the effect.