Nagsasa cove has all the right conditions for night photography: no artificial light pollution and wide open spaces to get that huge expanse of sky filled with stars.

Ideally, if you want to capture stars or star trails, a dark night without the moon is preferred, well at least by some. The stars are brighter and more visible on a dark night.

At the time I took the first shot above it was a day before full moon, so the moon was really bright. The moon at my back (east) so the scene in front of me was well illuminated. It felt like day actually, and even with the bright moon the sky was visibly filled with glittering stars.



Armed with an "intervalometer", I took a succession of shots, like the one above, with 2 seconds interval between each one (in hindsight it should have been 1 sec only). Each shot is 45 seconds in exposure and I took about 48 minutes worth of exposure before I finally got too sleepy. The shots were then "stacked" using a photo editing software to make the first photo you see on this post.


My friends brought tents, which made nice well lit subjects, while I roughed it out in hammock.


Another group made a bonfire and slept near it.