Multi-hour composite for APOD NLC image?

[noctal]

The NLC image on July 7 Astro Pic of the Day: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap180707.html
is impressive, but I think it should be classified as an artistic composite rather than a picture.

Does Ruslan Merzlyakov post here? I am interested in how he generated it. I do multi-hour composites and time-slices, which can be quite effective, but I always advertise them for what they are. I also support playing with contrast, brightness, gamma, bracketed HDR to help the image match our visual experience.

But there are a few too many issues in this image that rub me the wrong way:
- the sky gradation just doesn't look natural;
- how is the ground being illuminated?
Limited flashlight/torch painting is okay to some extent
- why is there orange twilight on the left, when the pink clouds are lit from the right?

Regards, Alister.
P.S. Good NLC season so far from Alberta Canada.

[johnm]

The EXIF data for this image seems reasonable for a single image but shows it has been edited in photoshop.

A lot of the EXIF data from the images on the Spaceweather.com NLC gallery seems to be unrelated to the actual image.

John

[sonic]

Lightroom

Personally I really like that image and it looks nice n natural to me - looks like he's used a gradient darkening of the top left corner which is quite obvious though.

Lightroom is a digital photographers dream development studio; its able to make the very best from raw files and bring images to life in stunning detail and colour - Love it to bits .. Check out some youtube tutes on Lightroom ..

An example of a 6 shot panorama before and after raw processing:

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