Lunar Photographing

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sun Jan 07, 2018 1:35 pm

Here's a link someone passed on to me about photographing a lunar eclipse.
The article suggests practicing on taking regular moon photo's so if anyone is interested, post tips you have or find and then feel free to share your lunar photo's on here.

tips for photographing the moon

tips for photographing a LUNAR eclipse

General Tips:

[+] SPOILER: Tripods are required. A good tripod is mandatory.
Use mirror lockup on an SLR.
Use a wired or wireless cable release, threaded release, or trigger the shutter with your smart device.
Bring fully charged batteries. A lunar eclipse takes hours to progress and the cold(er) temps of the nighttime air drain batteries fast. Bring extra batteries and keep them warm.
If you are going to be shooting a lot (not required for an eclipse), make sure you have enough memory cards. Lunar eclipses always happen at night, when B&H Photo is closed.
Most autofocus systems will have no issues locking onto the full moon. However, once that moon goes dark, the focus might lose its lock. Before that happens, switch over to manual focus and don't touch that focus ring!
Be patient. Unlike the relatively short-derationed solar eclipse that creates a frantic minute or two of photographic craziness, the lunar eclipse is a much slower event, giving the photographer time to experiment with settings to get the best result.
Bracket your exposures. If you're shooting digitally, each photo is free. Bracket, bracket, and bracket some more. Try different apertures, ISO settings, and shutter speeds to maximize your results. Later, take notes on what works best for you so you won't need to do as much experimenting the next time.

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sun Jan 07, 2018 1:38 pm

Admitting my ignorance:

"cold(er) temps of the nighttime air drain batteries fast. Bring extra batteries and keep them warm."

I'm not a professional photographer, I like to take pictures and I now have a good camera thanks to a very generous gift, so I would go out to take moon shots with a fully charged battery and then wonder why after a little while my battery was running low. No clue that it was because of the cold weather draining the battery!

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sun Jan 07, 2018 1:39 pm

some of my moon photo's: (use the magnifying glass to zoom in)

[+] SPOILER

My goal is take artistic photo's of the moon and at the same time try to capture angles of sharpness in the images as to highlight certain specifics such as craters, the rim of the moon, clouds, background, etc.

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sun Jan 07, 2018 1:39 pm

general lunar info:

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sun Jan 07, 2018 2:28 pm

Please feel free to share your lunar or planetary star sky images.

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Sat Feb 03, 2018 11:55 am

Some of my lunar eclipse Jan 31, 2018 photo's: (I did not realize how difficult these would be to get in focus with the Earth's shadow blurring the surface!)

[+] SPOILER

by **Diana** » Sun Feb 04, 2018 11:12 am

Your photos turned out way better than mine did holy cow! I really like the purple one!
My camera had a hard time focusing on the moon, so all my photos are mostly black, fuzzy, and look like I'm trying to photograph a lightbulb while it is on

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Tue Jun 12, 2018 12:14 pm

Moon in the day light

[+] SPOILER

by **Polaris** » Thu Sep 06, 2018 4:51 am

Woooaahhhhh! Why didn't I find this thread sooner?! D'X

Have you ever tried taking a photo/video of a meteorshower, Lemon?

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Thu Sep 06, 2018 8:30 pm

I'd love to one day Polaris but I have to study how to do it AND go to a place that is not affected by city lights. Someone I know did take photos about an hour drive away and they were spectacular!

by **Lemon Cheesecake** » Thu Jan 24, 2019 5:33 pm

Lunar eclipse January 20 2019...I think the ones I took last year were much better... though it didn't help to be waiting for the moon to appear through the clouds this time.