Advice on blending multiple photos including properly exposed moon

Often I am faced with wonderful scenes but lack the knowledge/skills to capture it.

I tried some night time photography at the weekend and was faced with a scene of some fishing boats on the shore with the moon in the sky and the light of the moon reflecting on the water. It looked amazing!

I did not know how to capture it as exposing for the moon would make everything else too dark. I therefore took several shots on the tripod with one exposed for the moon, one for the main scene (boats etc) and a few in betweens of the moon.

To be honest I have no idea how to combine these or if indeed it is possible to combine them to try and get the scene with the moon exposed properly and not just a white blob.

Here are 2 of the shots.The others are pretty much like the properly exposed moon shot but more exposed.

Any advice much appreciated. I have the latest version of Photoshop.

And another exposure

PSteven wrote in post #19131266
Often I am faced with wonderful scenes but lack the knowledge/skills to capture it.

I tried some night time photography at the weekend and was faced with a scene of some fishing boats on the shore with the moon in the sky and the light of the moon reflecting on the water. It looked amazing!

I did not know how to capture it as exposing for the moon would make everything else too dark. I therefore took several shots on the tripod with one exposed for the moon, one for the main scene (boats etc) and a few in betweens of the moon.

To be honest I have no idea how to combine these or if indeed it is possible to combine them to try and get the scene with the moon exposed properly and not just a white blob.

Here are 2 of the shots.The others are pretty much like the properly exposed moon shot but more exposed.

Any advice much appreciated. I have the latest version of Photoshop.

Hosted photo: posted by PSteven in
./showthread.php?p=191​31266&i=i147109165
forum: RAW, Post Processing & Printing

Hosted photo: posted by PSteven in
./showthread.php?p=191​31266&i=i36740685
forum: RAW, Post Processing & Printing

Personally I don't see anything wrong with the first image. I might be tempted to lift the shadows slightly to brighten it up a little bit, but that is it.

If you make the moon "the right size" you'll have to get rid of the water reflection that you love so much. I agree with John.

Thanks for the replies - I think you are right and I should just process the first image and not worry about getting the moon exposure spot on.

With a bit of processing to the single image.

PSteven wrote in post #19131489
With a bit of processing to the single image.

Hosted photo: posted by PSteven in
./showthread.php?p=191​31489&i=i146082580
forum: RAW, Post Processing & Printing

That's lovely. It's got oodles of atmosphere.

AnnieMacD wrote in post #19131693
That's lovely. It's got oodles of atmosphere.

Thank you

I combined image 1 and image 3, using only the moon and reflection from image 3. Above that, I painted out the moon in image 3 (blank layer in Darken mode) and painted in a new half-moon (free moon brushes can be found online). Also added back a bit of glow around the new moon (blank layer in soft light mode).

Here is a link to the PSD file with layers:
https://cp.sync.com …wycj79h-c35jttjp-g28qyrz6

Apologies - only just seen your message. I really like what you have done - thank you