Choosing the Right Lens for Nightscapes

Starry landscape photography, often referred to as nightscapes, is a demanding discipline that blends nature, the night sky, stars, and the Milky Way. Unlike daytime or urban photography, shooting at night requires special attention when it comes to choosing the right lenses.

Indeed, a lens that performs exceptionally well during the day can prove disappointing when used to capture tiny points of light against a black background. Stars, by their very nature, reveal optical flaws that are invisible in daylight. Several specific aberrations may appear and compromise the quality of your images.

Aberrations to Watch Out for in Astrophotography

Before investing in a lens dedicated to starry landscapes, it’s essential to understand and assess certain optical defects:

• Chromatic Aberration: Appears as a purple fringe around stars. While it can be corrected fairly easily in Lightroom, it’s better to minimize it from the start.

• Spherical Aberration: Produces a glow or halo around stars, reducing sharpness.

• Coma: A classic astrophotography flaw, it distorts some stars, giving them a small “tail” like a comet.

• Astigmatism: Turns stars into elliptical shapes or even "flying saucers."

These aberrations generally appear at the edges of the image and can often be reduced by slightly stopping down the aperture (typically by less than one stop). However, closing down the aperture too much becomes counterproductive: in astrophotography, fast lenses are preferred to minimize noise. Reducing the aperture forces an increase in ISO, which degrades overall image quality.

Useful Resources and Practical Considerations

To assess the optical quality of lenses for nightscapes, the website lenstip.com offers detailed reviews highlighting the aberrations of various lenses. It’s a valuable resource before making a purchase.

That said, recent advancements in AI-based noise reduction software are changing the game. Increasing ISO to compensate for a narrower aperture is now much less of an issue. Noise can now be corrected remarkably well.

My Personal Experience

Personally, I regularly use:

• a Samyang 14mm f/2.4,

• a Nikon 20mm f/1.2,

• and a Nikon Z 35mm f/1.8.

Each of these lenses has its minor imperfections, but overall I’m fully satisfied with them. There’s no such thing as a perfect lens, and with today’s modern noise reduction tools, even an entry-level optic can produce excellent results—as long as you're not aiming for oversized print formats.

In Summary

Success in starry landscape photography doesn’t rely solely on a lens’s brightness, but also on its ability to control the specific optical aberrations encountered in astrophotography. A good balance between aperture, aberration control, and modern post-processing is key to capturing the beauty of the night sky and the Milky Way.