Thanks for the hints folks. The strange thing is that when I use my plug in intervalometer, an Opteka unit, I can shoot with just one second between shots. I have LENR turned off and I'm shooting RAW.

Thanks for the hints folks. The strange thing is that when I use my plug in intervalometer, an Opteka unit, I can shoot with just one second between shots. I have LENR turned off and I'm shooting RAW.

I love the fact that the camera has a built in intervalometer, but I have a problem trying to do long exposure sequences. I want to shoot 30 second exposures, for star trails, and I want as little delay between shots as possible. I set the camera up for 30 second exposures, and the interval between shots to 31 seconds. The camera takes one shot and quits. If increase the interval to 33 or so, it will take 2 or 3 photos and stop. I need to increase the interval to 36 seconds before it will keep on shooting. But that 6 second skip is too long. If I use an external timer, (an inexpensive Opteka) I can set the delay between shots to 1 second, so I know the camera can handle it.
Does anyone know how to get Canon's built-in intervalometer to let me shoot 30 second exposures, with just a very short short delay between shots?

That is an awesome video. I learned a lot! Thanks for posting.

I was able to kludge something together using my Android Phone. I did this as an experiment to see if I could do it, but it's actually too involved for me.

Here are all of the pieces I needed:
Android Phone. For me it is a Moto X
A free phone App called Nexus Media Importer
A small cable called an On The Go (OTG) cable.
I have a combo memory card reader with slots for various card sizes and full size USB ports and a micro USB port.
An external disk drive
An external Battery pack.

Process:
1.Plug the memory card into the card reader/USB hub. Alternately, I suppose you could plug your camera's phone cord into the USB hub.
2. Plug The OTG cord into the USB hub and the other end into the phone.
3. Plug your external disk drive into it's power source.
4. Plug the exernal disk drive into the USB hub.
5. Open the Nexus media importer app.
5. In the App: use the Advanced features. Select the destination disk drive and navigate to the folder you want to use.
6. Select the source data drive, navigate to the directory with your images. Select all or just the images you want . Copy
7. Wait.
8. When done copying , exit the Nexus App and use the notifications shade to disconnect the drives.
9. Unplug
(If you don't do steps 7, 8 and 9 you run the risk of corrupted disk drive.)

I have the 12-24 F4. It is a great wide angle lens on my crop sensor Canon. I don't use it as much as I used to because I now have a 15-85 lens, too, You might want to choose between the 12-24 or 12-28 depending on what other lenses you have.

I use the feature occasionally. I don't think it is as good as Google Photos facial recognition. Like someone else said, I'd rate it 5 out of 10 stars.
Plus, if you do a group shot of a crowd, it will try to identify hundreds of people, no matter how small their faces may be.

I cannot find the article any longer. but for the geeky types with an android phone, I have seen a solution where you plug an OTG (on the go) cable into a Powered USB hub. Then plug in a portable external hard drive and your memory card reader or phone. Then use a file manager app on your phone to copy from the card to the disk drive. The phone essentially acts like a computer and handles the transfer. I have not tried this myself, but I'm going to try it before my next big trip.

On Canon's cameras the RAW, M-RAW and S-RAW all use 14bits. The difference is the resolution. According to this webpage:
[url]http://www.learn.usa.canon.com/resources/articles/2011/eos_qt_small_raw_images_article.htmlp[\url]

"Unlike reduced-resolution JPEG images, Canon's small RAW files give almost the same control over image processing that you get with a traditional full-resolution RAW file. And, they are recorded at full 14-bit per channel bit depth, which is the same as full-resolution RAW files from EOS Digital SLRs."

I'd try to take a smallish travel tripod.
I took a tour similar to yours. A tripod on the ship is of limited use because most of the time there will be other people at the railing trying to see the same thing you're photographing. If you have a balcony, it might be useful there, but only if you're lucky enough to be in your room at the right time.
On the excursions from the boat, you're mostly riding on a bus or train or small boat and the tripod won't work. When you do stop for something, it's often not for long. When the excursion ends you're dropped off in the little port near the boat with thousands of others. You might be able to sneak away a little and get some shots around that area.
On the inland excursion, once you get off the train you have a little more flexibility. I assume you're going to Denali. That's where I wish I had at least a small travel tripod. It would have helped for the shot here. We were lucky enough to get a clear day and see Denali from about 25 miles away.
DEFINITELY take a pair of binoculars, because you will see wonderous things out of photographic reach but memorable forever.

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Thanks for all of the nice comments. It's probably one of the most unique photos I've ever taken.

A friend and I were out for a walk while on vacation in western Oklahoma when we spotted a largish black bird with what looked like a white head. I took 3 photos ( my new Canon 7D mark II and 70-300 Canon lens at 300mm). The bird was quite a distance away, so we had to crop in significantly and we saw this. It is a raven with a large egg in it's mouth. We had seen and heard wild turkeys in the area, so we assume that somewhere there is a turkey nest missing at least one egg.
Technically, it's not the greatest photo, but I think capturing a unique scene makes it worthwhile.

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That is a pretty good shot.

With that much focal length 600*2*2*1.6 crop factor = 3840mm that's some serious magnification, or 1881 if you have the 1.4 teleconverters.

Everything has to be perfect to get a good shot. You need a ultra steady mount, you probably need to be tracking, focus must be exact, you need a very good lens and then the atmosphere needs to be steady. I think you did pretty well under the conditions. Have you tried your SCT?

To get a shot like this, most astrophotogaphers would be using an actual telescope which generally performs better and they might be stacking multiple frames.

I still use my 40D as my only DSLR. It is a step above the entry level Rebel line of cameras in terms of build quality.

From my perspective the Pros are:
Good build quality - this was a semi-pro camera back in the day
Semi-Pro features and flexibility
Very good frame rate
Inexpensive (now)
Still takes great pictures. Some said the 50D was actually a step backwards because they crammed in more pixels at the expense of quality.
This was Canon's first camera with live view and dust removal

Cons:
Only 10megapixels
Cannot microadjust the focusing
Noise not too bad at ISO800, gets pretty bad at 1600. Action shooters will find this a limitation because it will force slower shutter speeds than you might want in dimmer lighting situations.
Limited number of focus points
Does not do video.

Another suggestion. Depending on what type of photography you do, a good tripod can work wonders. Obviously it will not help much if you're chasing kids around, but for wildlife, landscapes portraits and even sports it will help immensely.
Bill