Photos from Sept. 13th, 2025, at Pelican Lake in Ninette, MB.
Pelican Lake
Patrick
Sunset, August 31
Yesterday was a looooooong day, but it had a glorious moment as the ground rose up to cover the sun.
There’s a sunrise and a sunset every single day, and they’re absolutely free. Don’t miss so many of them.
—Jo Walton
The Galaxy, August 21, 2025
Last night I found myself on Road 81W about half a mile south of Highway 16. I had my camera and my tripod, so I thought, Well, why not? Why not take some shots of the Milky Way?
The header image, above, is a single shot of the galaxy above the prairie horizon.
This is a panoramic photo, nine photos, roughly 3×3, to capture more of the height of the galaxy than I could with any single image.
And this is an 11-image stack of a portion of the galaxy, which hopefully brings out some of the detail better than any single shot could.
Info for Nerds
All images were 30 second exposures at 11mm, f/2.8, ISO 3200.
I merged[1]Use the “Lighten Only” mode, Pat, for future reference. 10 dark frames into a single “dark master”[2]Sounds Sith, but it ain’t. to eliminate or at least limit hot pixels in the images. The Image Magick command composite {image}.jpg -compose minus_dst {dark-frame}.jpg {image}_cleaned.jpg is how I did the dark frame subtraction.
The aligning and stacking was done with tools from Hugin Panorama Tools[3]Hugin is part of Panorama Tools, apparently. and Image Magick—align_image_stack *.jpg -a aligned_ to align the images, then mogrify -format jpg *.tif to convert the TIFF files to JPEG, mostly so my computer isn’t bogging down trying to process huge image files.
The panorama was created with Hugin—my luck with aligning night-time panoramas with Huginn is hit-or-miss, but I find it generally can find enough control points in a group of Milky Way shots to do its magic.
…I should just make a page about all that, shouldn’t I. A reference for my own use, if no one else’s.
Stayed up late again
I think it was worth it, even if a thunderstorm woke me up early this morning.
I shot at Spruces for about an hour and a half, and met a couple who had stopped in on their way from Brandon to Dauphin. (Hi, Doms & Debs, if you’re reading this!)
Here are a couple timelapses, one of the Milky Way floating above Clear Lake and another of the stars wheeling across the sky.
Writing Retreat 2025
This year I’d like to:
- Get some or all of a first draft on “What’s Done is Undone”
- Submit something to Augur and/or Tales & Feathers
- Get out in a kayak a couple times[1]It looks like the weather might cooperate.
- Ride my bike daily, even if it’s just around the cabin area
- Conjure up a clear night or two for some Milky Way photos or star trails
- Read a couple books
- relaaaaaaaax
My “week” is a little truncated this year—I’ll be here for 5½ days, roughly—but I’m planning to make the most of it.
Header photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | It looks like the weather might cooperate. |
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Where I grew up
On my way up to Manipogo for the gents’ camping trip, I stopped in at a few of the places where I spent a lot of time in my formative years. It might be a while before I go that way again, so I took some photos.
Camping with The Gents
I got back earlier today from a camping trip to Manipogo with three other gentlemen. We ate like kings, drank some fiery drinks, enjoyed a ridiculous game or six of “Chicken Time Warp”, paddled on the lake, stared at the stars, discussed the world’s problems, and generally had a relaxing time.
Same time(ish) next year, guys.
The Milky Way at an abandoned church
Last night the sky was clear and my batteries were charged. I loaded up my gear and headed to a spot I found last fall: an abandoned church south of me.
For almost the entire time I was there—about 10:45pm till 2am—it was just me and the fireflies and the crickets. A truck drove by at one point (very slowly, because I’d seen them coming and turned on my car’s lights), but other than that I was alone under the stars.
Look at all those fireflies.
I did up a multi-photo panorama, too, before I left.
Below is a timelapse of the night. It’s made of 169 still images, each one a 30-second exposure at 11mm, f/2.8, ISO800.
It was almost 3am by the time I got to bed. It’s been a while since I stayed up that late. I think it was worth it, though.
Update
I just spent 90 minutes or so stacking 16 images from my 2nd camera into this image of a portion of the galaxy.
Art in the trees
Spotted on my bike ride earlier today.
Review: The Strange
A Facebook friend of mine recommended The Strange by Nathan Ballingrud. My local library was able to get a copy via interlibrary loan, and I picked it up on Friday. Last night—Monday—I finished reading it.
It starts off a bit like True Grit[1]I’ve only seen the Coens’ version of the movie, but I’ve heard it hews pretty close to the Charles Portis novel. One day I’ll have to read it.—a rough-around-the-edges life in a frontier town, narrated by a thirteen-year-old girl. But it’s set on Mars. In 1931.
Continue reading “Review: The Strange”Footnotes
| ↑1 | I’ve only seen the Coens’ version of the movie, but I’ve heard it hews pretty close to the Charles Portis novel. One day I’ll have to read it. |
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