Wednesday, February 27, 2013

A new favorite moon set

I was taking Jasper out for his morning pee at about 6:00 this morning.  I saw that the sky was clear and the moon was full.  If you catch it right, you can get the moon setting just as the sun comes up.

I set my camera up out on the deck with a 500mm lens and a 2.0x teleconver.  It was 7 degrees out and I was wandering around in sock feet.    My first few shots were just trying to get the right exposure for the moon.  Cameras seem to always want to get this wrong, so I always do moon photography in Manual.
 As the moon started to set, I got a better sense of exactly where it was going to cross the ridge.  I noticed that someone had been up doing some hiking and backcountry skiing.
 Just as the moon was ducking behind the ridge, the pink-purple glow from the sunrise hit the snow on the mountain top, giving me one of my favorite moon photos.
The only pisser is that I didn't do quite enough to minimize the slight blur from the motion of the camera and lens. The picture looks ok until you do a high resolution version, at which point you can see all the faults.

Reminders to me for my next moon photo are:

  • Get my lazy ass off the deck.  It moves a bit. get on firm ground or pavement
  • Hang my bean bag (16 pounds) off the tripod to keep it still
  • Sacrifice a bit of ISO for a faster shutter speed
Live and learn....

2 comments:

Emily J. said...

And yet everyone who has seen that last shot loves it--including me! (The others are good, too, but this one is my favorite!)

LaurieJ said...

Absolutely beautiful shots, Steve!