Help photographing Bioluminescent Phytoplankton during the super moon please

I'm going to be spending the Supermoon on Ilha Do Mel, which is in Brazil. They have Bioluminescent Phytoplankton during the full moon, and we will have a crazy full moon this week! I shoot with an Sony Rx1Rii.

I'm trying to think about how the best way to shoo this will be. Anyone have suggestions?

Heya,

Two exposures. One for the moon. One for the plankton. No way around it. The moon will be bright, very bright. I would expect 6~8 stops of difference between the moon and the beach the plankton are washing up on. So unless your sensor can handle that kind of dynamic range, I would just go to two exposures. Expose the plankton first (longer exposure), since that's more rare. Then expose the moon (short exposure). Make a composite.

Very best,

As MalveauX stated, I would shoot 2 exposures, then merge in Photoshop as a composite image (assuming your are shooting in raw, for best overall potential).

For the moon, I would shoot at ISO100, f/13-f/16 and around 1/100th second (you'll have to play with this on your camera to find the best exposure settings, but a start.

For the phytoplankton, I would shoot at f/2, ISO 400 and around 5 seconds as a starting point.

Once you have dialed in the exposures for the moon & phytoplankton, you should be able to create a good composite (similar to this using images created in 2013, where I shot a Full Moon in April, then the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas during National Finals Rodeo in December and created a composite):

If you need it to be darker for the luminescent with the moon closer to the horizon, you might want to go the night after it's full. The moon rises about 50 minutes later each night, but will appear just as full.