The Story Behind the Photo

July 2026: Graffiti

Ron Steinke

I’ve always wanted to light paint the graffiti bus in Washtucna at night. I knew the milky way would line up with the bus in the spring. I’ve always prioritized Palouse Falls state park over the bus, but not tonight (I did both).

First, I checked the weather forecast for clear skies. First stop was the bus. I brought two lights to put inside the bus. I dropped the light down to 2% luminosity, and put one light in the front and one in the back of the bus. I set up the camera on a tripod at f/8 to get as much as possible in focus. I had to play with the shutter speed a bit get the correct light in the histogram. Then I used a flashlight to light paint the ground and outside of the bus. The bus and ground is a single exposure (34 seconds).

When I was done with the bus, the milky way wasn’t up yet in the sky, I drove to Palouse Falls waited for the milky way to rise and used

the same lens 28mm at f/2, tracked the sky for 2 minutes at ISO 640.

Using Photoshop I blended both shots together to make this composite image. I will say the sky would align with the ground shot if I had waited a few more hours , but I also wanted to get the milky way at the falls.

Canon EOS R converted to full spectrum.

Ground shot: Used an IR/cut filter that mimics a normal camera for the ground shot.

Lens was Sigma 28mm at f/8, ISO 3200, for 34 seconds.

Sky shot: Used a visible + H-alpha filter 28mm f2 iso 640 at 2 minutes. My tracker is the Nomad made by MSM.