Timelapse tutorial from Down Under: Watch Mark Gee “Syrp” his way around the star field

New Zealand-based photographer Mark Gee has created an excellent tutorial on how to set up a motion star timelapse using the Syrp Genie. Gee also uses a Syrp Magic Carpet slider. While he discusses setting up his Syrp gear, much of his tutorial offers tips that apply to astrophotography in general.

Using a Canon 6D and Canon 14mm f/2.8 wide angle lens, Gee goes through his camera settings, including shooting with RAW image quality and setting his white balance to tungsten or incandescent white balance preset. Gee generally uses a thirty second exposure and an aperture of f/2.8, with an ISO between 3200 and 6400, but he suggests starting at ISO 1600 and going from there because different cameras perform differently at higher ISOs.

After discussing setting up his camera and his Syrp gear out in the field, Gee discusses post-processing. Like Cal Thomson, Gee also uses the LRTimelapse plug-in for Adobe Lightroom. He likes to first neutralize the white balance in his RAW images, before adjusting white and black points and utilizing the tone curve in Lightroom.

To watch Gee set up his gear and go through his entire post-processing workflow, including making localized sky adjustments and cleaning up his images in Lightroom, check out the tutorial below. You can also see Gee using the LR Timelpase plug-in and export the final timelapse video.

To see more of Gee's work, check out his website and his Instagram. 

(Seen via ISO 1200)