This the info straight from the photographer, Wally Pacholka, as posted on Society for Popular Astronomy message board.
"Hi Gang,
I am the one that took this photo of this amazing place
Got a lot of comments on this so here is the real deal - short story & long story. Wally
Astroman,
I have no problem at all giving details about the False-Kiva Indian
Cave photograph. Since I have been hit with 100's of inquires about
this amazing photograph in the last few days I will attach a long
answer that will I hope answer most questions. The short answer is
that this real genuine photograph of a wide Indian Cave that required
panoramic stitching of 4 separate side by side single frame
photographs each showing the sky/landscape in one single 25 second
exposure at high iso setting without a tracking tripod giving pin
point stars and a sharp foreground with the small mm lens that I used.
I sent a correction to the APOD folk that this is not a long exposure
and that it is a pano stitching of 4 side by side single frame shots
each with sky/landscape frozen in the 25 sec exposure. I did not get
a chance to proof the APOD caption so some things are there that they
may have assumed but are not what actually happened - but thru no
fault of there own, but I simply failed to mention when I submitted
the image. They have published 28 other images of mine and all of
those were single image, so it is natural for them to asume this was a
single image. It is important to note that this is not a composite
image but a stitching of 4 separate side by side sky/landscape single
frame shots. Todays cameras do not need tracking systems to get pin
point stars if the exposure is short and the iso high so now
photographers can have the best of both worlds - sharp sky and sharp
landscape, but I also have 40 years experience doing this sort of
thing. It is easier now. But not if you consider that I made 4 1200
mile round trips to this location with bad photographic results and
only got my keeper shot after much planning (waiting for cresent moon
to light the hills) and was successful only on this 5th trip. See
brightnightgallery.com for more of my pics. That's the short answer.
That's long was is:
Sorry, I must of answered these questions a 100 times so am sending a
blanket explanation to help folk understand that the photo is indeed
real in every detail:
1. Answers to question #1 about how False Kiva photograph was taken:
I am simply an amateur astronomer that loves the night sky and has a
passion for recording the night sky as it really is from interesting
settings like national parks and landmarks that folk are familiar with.
I have been doing this now for 44 years and in that time not only have
I learnt a few things but I have seen tremendous advances in
technology that enable folk to take photographs of the stars as pin
points in seconds rather than minutes like in the old days. My night
sky/landscape photographs which are my trademark have traditionally
always been single frame shots of both the night sky and landmarks in
one single exposure. In the olden days like for comet hale-bopp, the
longer time exposures with tracked camera to follow the stars would
always leave a tell tail sign on the landscape rocks as they would
blur if lit or they would cast a shadow against the background stars
if you lit them momentarily like with a flash. Now a days, all is
different. Anybody with a decent digital camera like canon 20D and
24mm lens with high iso like 1600 at f/1.6 can record deep detail in
the Milky Way in just 20 seconds and 10 times more stars than the eye
can see. So now it is an easy matter to capture stars frozen as points
of light and the foreground in sharp focus with no movement even when
focused on infinite with the right lens. Folk that are saying there
must be star trails or ground movement in a shot like the False Kiva
shot are very accurate in their assessment for equipment and
technology that is several years old, but they are sadly lacking in
what can be done today with some of the more basic DSLR cameras
cameras that are available at the local costco store.
How False Kiva was taken:
Been to False Kiva Indian Cave near Moab, Utah (1600 mile round trip
from my home in Long Beach, CA) 4 previous times, all
photographic failures, hiked the 2 mile trail with last part down a
very steep canyon wall trail, hiked out in dark and got lost each and
every time. It's dark out there.
Canon 5D, iso 1600 Raw, f/2.5, 25 second exposure with camera on a
stationary tripod (no tracking). The cave is huge, so the 24 mm lens
required me to take 4 separate (camera vertical) shots shooting one
shot at 25 seconds and then moving the camera horizontally for the
next shot and so on until I got the entire cave. Each shot was a
sky/landscape shot and I had a professional lab stitch the photos
together with a panoramic blending software to make it one continuous
horizontal shot as I am a photoshop moron.
The lighting was from 4 sources (which I learnt from my 4 previous
failed attempts - after all one can drive 1600 miles to take a single
shot only so many times). The stars/Milky Way of course provided their
own light for the sky, the trip was planned for a small crescent moon
to be setting in the west to light up the left and center canyon
walls, and a large flashlight was positioned out side the cave on the
left to bounce light off a flat rock to hit the right canyon wall with
some faint light. Inside the cave, I used a series of flashlights and
or strobes to bounce light off the far left/right walls to evenly
light the cave (there was no direct lighting).
There was absolutely no superimposing of any portion in this image or
any other image I have ever done. To me that's important as my whole
purpose is to show folk what the sky really is like from different
landmarks in this great country of ours. As for the questioning about
why no haze is seen next to the horizon in the sky yet is seem in the
far canyon hills then my guess would be that those saying such are
thinking of a day shot. This is a night shot - everything is dark. It
rained that day heavily so there was no haze. It is the crescent moon
that is lighting up the close canyon walls and they are sharp, but the
farther you go down you run into moon shadow that is not haze but
simply darkness where the camera can not record detail so it looks
like haze. The same for the far canyon walls look like they are
covered with haze, but it is just because they are so far, the slight
moonlight does not bounce back enough light from those far canyons
for the camera to see any detail (some folk are calling that haze), yet
the stars which have their own light of course show through the haze
which is not there (but only in folks minds) and hits the camera
sensors full on.
I have been around long enough to know that no matter what
explanation I give as to how real a photograph I took is, there are
always the arm chair folk that would rather criticised others than do
anything themselves. If you don't believe what I say (everything here
is testable) and then believe the great body of work I have done over
the years that is clearly recognized by experts in the field of
astronomy/photography. This is my 29th Astronomy Picture of Day. Those
folk are not
dummies. I might be able to fool the APOD folk one time, but 29
times????
How about TIME-LIFE photo editors. They picked my Hale-Bopp pic as Pic
of year in 1997 - out of millions submitted. They also picked my Mars
Closest encounter in 50,000 years as Pic of year in 2003 for both LIFE
magazine and a different image for TIME magazine, again out of
millions submitted. My night sky work sells in over 30 national parks,
where each park goes thru an interpretive review process to determine
that the photos are genuine - none have been turned down. NASA still
has my Hale-Bopp shot on their front Hale-Bopp web page, etc....
For those of you who can, just enjoy the photograph and for others
that can't do that then simply take one that we all can enjoy.
We live in a great country with so much to see and photograph.
There is much that is untouched waiting for us to capture.
May you enjoy the process.
All the best.
Wally Pacholka
An amateur astronomer - my greatest honor
See more of my Pics at brightnightgallery.com'
2. Answers as to why APOD's description differs a little from mine
(like long exposure vs short exposure)
When I submitted the photograph to APOD I did not mention anything
about exposure. When they run a photo they do not check with the
photographer if everything in their comments are correct or not.
Generally these guys are dead on accurate. These guys know me (as they
have published me 28x prior) and in every case prior I have always
submitted single image one frame sky/landscape shots so in this case
they assumed this is Wally so it has to be single exposure. Keep in
mind, I submitted a horizontal pano photograph so I could show the
whole cave, but that pano is made up of 4 side by side sky/landscape
shots where each frame is a shot of the sky and landmark(cave) all in
one single exposure. This is no composite of the sky being put it. It
is a horizontal pano stitch of the sky and cave at once. With modern
cameras with high iso and short exposures the sky and landmarks can be
shot in one single exposure. Here I simply stitched 4 such shots
together to give the viewer the complete panoramic view. Every rock
and star is real in the photo.
May each of you experience this wonderful place called False Kiva someday.
See more of my Pics at brightnightgallery.com
Wally Pacholk
Originally Posted by Rob Oplawar
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