Welcome to the twentieth edition of our User Story series.

This time, we're traveling to Monte Vettore in Italy, where Giorgio Castelli (@giraffone92) hiked three hours to spend a night beneath the stars, using NOMAD to capture the Milky Way above a mountain hut, combining tracked RGB and H-alpha exposures with a carefully composed rocky foreground.

🏔️ The Milky Way over Monte Vettore

On July 19, Gianluca, a friend with whom I share the passion for astrophotography, and I decided to spend a night on Monte Vettore (Marche, Italy) to photograph the Milky Way. 

Carrying our camera gear and sleeping bags, we started a three-hour hike in the afternoon to reach the Tito Zilioli Mountain Hut. 

We chose not to bring a tent in order to travel light and spend the night outdoors beneath the stars.

Once we reached our destination, we enjoyed the sunset over the surrounding peaks and, as darkness fell, began searching for the best composition for our image.

Around 12:30 a.m., the Galactic Center would align behind the mountain hut, creating a beautiful composition.

While waiting, we enjoyed a simple but delicious dinner of sandwiches filled with local cured meats and cheeses, taking in the silence of the mountains and the darkness gradually enveloping the landscape.

After dinner, we began capturing the foreground. We positioned the camera very close to the ground to include not only the hut but also the rocks in the foreground, whose shape naturally guides the viewer’s eye toward the main subject.

We then moved on to photographing the Milky Way, first capturing the RGB data and later the H-alpha data to highlight the emission nebulae within the Galactic plane.

It was a wonderful evening spent with a friend, an opportunity to escape the summer heat of the city, reconnect with nature, and enjoy a beautiful starry sky from one of the most scenic locations in the Apennines.

🌌 Imaging Session

1. Focus Stacking for a Sharp Foreground

Because the foreground rocks were only a few centimeters from the lens, a single exposure would not have been enough to keep the entire frame in focus.

For this reason, I used a focus stacking technique consisting of three images captured at different focus points. Each shot was taken with the following settings: 3 minutes, f/4, ISO 800.

2. Exposure Bracketing for Village Lights

Another challenge was dealing with the lights from the villages visible in the background.

When exposing correctly for the hut, the town lights became heavily overexposed, with some areas nearly blown out.

To recover the highlights, I captured a seven-frame exposure bracket, progressively reducing the exposure time in each shot.

3. Capturing RGB and H-alpha Data

The sky acquisition was divided into two phases.

The first consisted of the RGB data: 20 tracked exposures of 1 minute each at f/2.8 and ISO 800.

The second phase consisted of the H-alpha data: 5 tracked exposures of 3 minutes each at f/2.8 and ISO 3200.

🖥️ Post-Processing

1.Foreground Stacking and Exposure Blending

I began by combining the three foreground images in Photoshop to obtain a fully sharp image from front to back.

Then, working with multiple layers in Photoshop, I blended the bracketed exposures to recover the highlights of the distant villages and achieve a balanced exposure.

2.RGB Stacking and Color Adjustments

Next, I processed the sky, starting with the RGB data. Using PixInsight, I stacked the Milky Way exposures and then transferred the image to Photoshop for color correction.

I further enhanced the contrast within the Milky Way using curves adjustments and selective dodge and burn techniques.

3.H-alpha Integration and Final Blending

I then stacked the H-alpha exposures in PixInsight, aligned them with the RGB data with Register, and combined them to enhance the emission nebulae present in the Galactic Center region.

Finally, I blended the completed foreground and sky images in Photoshop, carefully matching colors and tones to create a natural and seamless transition between earth and sky.