We generally have a positive and encouraging approach with people we meet.  But when something needs to be said...  well, you know.

A little while ago, I was in Badlands National Park shooting what I thought was going to be epic clouds, and stars under the moonlight.  A group of ladies showed up and parked their cars a little ways away. Then they got out of their cars, turned on their red headlamps, and walked past me (on my right) looking out into the area where I was shooting.

After my image exposed and I saw the horror, I kindly walked over and asked If I could make a suggestion. They said sure... I told them about the bleed in the red headlamps and that it would be very nice of them to use a dimmer white light. I also mentioned in the kindest way possible that if the white light gets into the scene you can fix it much easier in PS than you can the red light. They nodded and said ok but I could tell they weren't buying it...

While astronomers have some good alternatives for stacking multiple exposures to reduce noise, the apps they use are generally expensive and complicated to use.  For these reasons, I tend to like using Photoshop to handle stacking my images.  Other options have been limited and hard to get excited about.  Over the past few years however, the quality of our options and my opinions of them have changed significantly.

Background
Wide-field astrophotographers have looked to Adobe Photoshop to handle their stacking needs for years.  It hasn't been a perfect fit but when combining 4 or so exposures to reduce noise, it's been an effective tool in reducing noise.  For those people who like to stack more than 4, staying with Photoshop pushes most people past the limits of their Photoshop skills.  And in looking at 3rd party alternatives, there simply haven't been good alternatives available since most of them are expensive and complicated to learn and use.

Several years ago, we posted an article titled "Recommended Lenses For Night Photography" that a lot of people found helpful.  Since then, a lot has changed that affects the lenses my training partner Darren White and I most like to recommend as the best choices so I decided that this original article deserved an update with the latest information and recommendations.

Background
As a night photography workshop instructor, I'm committed to getting great nightscape images.  And while we believe that the best images come from a combination of great composition, great technique, and having an eye for  great image, having good gear certainly helps to make a difference.  we think the gear is secondary to these first three items but it does help.  We get a lot of questions from our students about what gear works best and so we like to have some good answers for them.  On the approach to our workshops, we often get asked if we were to recommend one single lens, which one we would recommend to help students get the best shots possible.