Photography Tips - Nighttime Focus
Focusing can be one of the more daunting nightscape photography tasks. Since auto-focus on the modern DSLR and Mirrorless cameras is both unbelievably fast and amazing sharp it's a task we usually leave to the electronics. However when the lights go out the auto-focus stops working.
Step One
Switch that camera into manual focus and while you're at it make sure you switch the lens as well. There is nothing worse than getting good focus and leaving auto-focus switched on in one of these two spots thus losing that focus the instant you touch the shutter.
Step Two
Set your exposure somewhere close to what you think you will need. Your aperture should be wide open, shutter speed high enough but not so high that you get tailing in the stars and ISO as high as you think you'll need. You can tweak these settings later but right now you need to be able to at least see some stars on the back of your camera.