I failed miserably on this subject in the Spring of 2018. Milky Way shooting requires a different set of skills than my usual photography, which centers around the KISS rule—keep it simple, stupid! Let the right side of your brain be in charge and express emotions and feelings. Keep the camera and technology as far as possible in the background. Nighttime is different; there’s motion in the stars with long exposures, high ISO and related noise problems, focusing in the dark, and more. And this comes after you plan your subject! It is a bit of an engineering problem, not my normal methods. But I do I like the process, and recently I returned to this location and had much better results. I think that "success" was the result of a better understanding of my Canon and ISO speeds, and much better focusing in the dark. And I have used a star-tracker over the years too. Again this extra piece of equipment can be a pain … but used correctly, it allows much longer exposures of the Milky Way which result in greater detail in the stars. My exposure in this capture was two minutes using a new Canon 16-35L, Version 3 lens. All this matters in after dusk shooting. I have always kept it SIMPLE when shooting, but these days, it is no longer so!.
All the best!
Margaret and Vern