Posted on 11/12/2016 11:40:22 AM PST by BenLurkin
2. Scout the location carefully
Use every tool possible to get the perfect shot, including Google Maps and compasses, to help you locate a spot where you'll be able to see the moon as well as the reference object you want to include. That may mean learning how to read a map, and finding out where the moon will appear on the horizon based on your location. If possible, travel to an area far from city lights to avoid light pollution. And make sure to be precise; Ingalls said he recalls setting up near Washington, D.C.'s Iwo Jima monument hundreds of yards away from a horde of photographers. "I thought my calculations were wrong, but sure enough, the moon popped up right where I expected, and then came the stampede," he said
5. Use advanced DSLR techniques
Another thing to remember is that daylight white balance is the best setting to capture the moonlight, according to Ingalls. After all, the moon is reflecting the sun's light. If you're planning to use a longer lens, "Keep in mind that the moon is a moving object. It's a balancing act between trying to get the right exposure and realizing that the shutter speed typically needs to be a lot faster,"
6. Use your smartphone
If you don't have an SLR camera on hand, Ingalls said you can still get some fun panoramic shots on a smartphone. (He joked that as a professional photographer, he would personally find the experience "maddening and frustrating," though.) He suggested going to an urban area with a lighted foreground. Once you're there, "Tap the screen, and hold your finger on the object (in this case, the moon) to lock the focus," he said. "Then, slide your finger up or down to darken or lighten the exposure."
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Buy a zoom lens next week and then take a picture of December’s not quite supermoon. No one will know the difference.
Going to the beach, but there’s a probability of overcast.
I’m naming it the Yuuuge Moon. Should be perfect conditions in vegas.
Scout out your location the night before & take practice shots.
Use a good tripod.
Pretty weak advice. Here are mine
Tripod
Highest ISO possible, I go upto 6400
PhotoPills, I phone app
Looney f/11 rule: ISO 100, Exposure 1/100 second, f/11
Vary as necessary, e.g, ISO 200, depending on circumstances. On auto exposure, the moon tends to get washed out, saturates, because it only occupies a small number of the cells and the camera will generally average over the field of view.
Use a tripod.
Use delayed aperture to allow the camera to settle. Use “mirror up” if you have it.
Use optical zoom.
With an APS-C camera (most common interchangeable lens camera chip format) your horizontal (narrower) field of view will be be about equal to the diameter of the moon at 1900 mm focal length and scales proportionately from there. At 200 mm FL, the diameter of image of the moon will be about one-tenth the shorter dimension, at 50mm, one twentieth. Half these numbers with a full-frame camera.
If you use a phone camera, I would recommend max zoom and hoping for the best.
The surface of moon is blazingly bright, almost as bright as sand on a sunny beach, especially a full moon. Albedo varies but is highest during a full moon. (Because of shadowing at other phases.)
If you want to take a picture of the moon that does not appear to be a flat white disk, follow the looney f/11 rule. (I have a lot of experience doing this.) If you want to take a picture by moon light, you might try higher ISO, but if the moon is in the frame, it will appear to be washed out.
Makes sense.
f/11 @125th is my starting spot
To bad it’s Monday, it would probably be a perfect shot to get it with the Mt Lewis FAA radar up in the Shoshone range.
It always looks like it snowed on the mountain tops when a really bright full moon rises up there at night. There is a slickensided rock on the side of the canyon on my place there that glows ethereally in moonlight, a friend and his wife got freaked out by it and went and got a hotel until I got out there the next day when we were meeting out there for camping. It looks like a piece of chrome or a mirror is discarded there when it’s hit right in the daylight.
Looks like a super clear sky here in Colorado Springs.
I have a Nikon D5500 which is of course the compact frame, and 55-300 mm kit lens I was thinking of using.
For some reason I wasn’t sure if it went down to F11 but it does.
I have it on manual and will let you know how it turns out.
Another Super Moon?
We never had them when I was a kid.
What’s up with that?
heh heh
Back when they were called ‘perigee-syzygy moons’, no one but science geeks noticed.
Closest moon since 1948, FWIW.
Human carbon emissions have caused the moon to bloat.
True. The whole "supermoon" meme is lame, but if stimulates interest in astronomy or photography or astrophotography, it's good.
Closest moon, or closest full moon?
At 6400 you are going to have a grainy picture.
You will do just as well much lower. The moon is actually quite bright.
Didn’t seem to directly answer the question. A so-called “supermoon” is when perigee and full moon occur close to the same time. My question was whether this is the closest the moon will be since 1948, the closest it has been to earth at perigee since 1948.
In 1948 these circumstances obtained:
Perigee: Jan 26 11:17 356462 km
Full: Jan 26 7:12
In 2016:
Perigee: Nov 14 11:24 356511 km
Full: Nov 14 13:54
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