First decent moon shot - 6/5/09

[Shivpics]

Hi gang,

This is probably the best moon shot I have ever taken. I did some color and sharpness tweaking. It's nowhere near as good as other moon shots that I've seen here. How can I do better next time?

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3625/3600553160_00d383c438_o.jpg

Equipment used: Rebel XTi and Tokina AT-X 80-400

Exposure: 0.005 sec (1/200)
Aperture: f/8.0
Focal Length: 400 mm
Exposure: +0.30
ISO Speed: 100
Exposure Bias: +2 EV

[A.S.I.G.N. Observatory]

Focus is your biggest enemy here. Unfortunately, a full moon is so saturated with light, it makes it hard to pick a good focus point. If you want to do full moon shots, try to manually focus and bracket some shots at, out of, and just inside what you think looks focused.

A better time to do it would be on a quarter moon or crescent. The line where light turns to darkness is called the terminator and gives great depth and contrast. Valleys, cliffs, cauldrons and all the terrain stand out in sharp relief and give a great opportunity to get focus right.

[Shivpics]

Thanks for the tips! Actually, I did bracket and focus manually. I like your suggestion of taking "shots at, out of, and just inside what" I think looks focused. Gonna try that.

Thanks again!

Focus is your biggest enemy here. Unfortunately, a full moon is so saturated with light, it makes it hard to pick a good focus point. If you want to do full moon shots, try to manually focus and bracket some shots at, out of, and just inside what you think looks focused.

A better time to do it would be on a quarter moon or crescent. The line where light turns to darkness is called the terminator and gives great depth and contrast. Valleys, cliffs, cauldrons and all the terrain stand out in sharp relief and give a great opportunity to get focus right.

[Peerie]

With the Moon being a considerable distance any movement will cause a blurring. I assume that you are hand holding the camera and the 400mm lens. I recently saw an excellent shot of the moon with a similar camera and a 70-300 lens; it was very sharp - he had it on a tripod. Perhaps this is the way to go.

John

[Shivpics]

Nope...tripod all the way. Considering the lens and that the moon is always moving, I wouldn't try hand-holding this shot. I also used the countdown timer to avoid possible shake from me pressing the shutter button.

With the Moon being a considerable distance any movement will cause a blurring. I assume that you are hand holding the camera and the 400mm lens. I recently saw an excellent shot of the moon with a similar camera and a 70-300 lens; it was very sharp - he had it on a tripod. Perhaps this is the way to go.

John

[Peerie]

I would hand hold with an image stabilisation lens.

The moon doesn't move that much in 1/200 of a second. It moves one degree every four minutes.

What do you think the focus issue is?

John

[DogBreath]

Nice shot i don't think its the moon moving more the photographer definitely a tripod shot!!

[Shivpics]

@ Peerie: Good point on the IS. I don't have any IS glass, though. Not sure what the focus issue is. Looks good through the viewfinder. I'm going to try A.S.I.G.N. Observatory's suggestions on that.

@ DB: Thanks!

[Bernoulli]

Neither IS nor a tripod will help here because the blur isn't from motion. At 1/200 sec you won't get any of that.

It's just a focus issue, and ASIGN's advice should help. I get good results from autofocus with almost any lens, but you have to activate only the center focus point and use that. Manual focusing on a very distant streetlight works too, but it has to be many hundreds of yards away to be sure you're at infinite focus. A star will work if you can find one bright enough.

Keep at it, everything but the focus looks really good. You'll get a great shot when it all comes together.

[Shivpics]

Thanks! I'll keep trying and hopefully return with better results.

Thanks to all for the advice. That's why I love this board.

Neither IS nor a tripod will help here because the blur isn't from motion. At 1/200 sec you won't get any of that.

It's just a focus issue, and ASIGN's advice should help. I get good results from autofocus with almost any lens, but you have to activate only the center focus point and use that. Manual focusing on a very distant streetlight works too, but it has to be many hundreds of yards away to be sure you're at infinite focus. A star will work if you can find one bright enough.

Keep at it, everything but the focus looks really good. You'll get a great shot when it all comes together.