Moon..Is it worth trying more with this lens?

I'm finding it difficult to get much better than this:

If you get your settings right, a 40D with a 70-200L should give you some nice pictures. Close down your aperture a stop or two, slow down the shutter, and drop the iso down some. The focus is really touchy on the moon; I end up shooting a ton of exposures with the smallest focus adjustments I can make between them, to get a couple of good ones.

Try ISO 100....f/8 and 1/250. Take a few shots....adjust your settings as needed.

I will next time I can..

Thanks..

It looks to me as if you're simply limited by the focal length of your lens. The focus looks spot on as does the exposure. Only you know how far you had to pull the exposure for this frame, but from the exif, it's the equivalent of Woolburr's starting point. You have the headroom to drop the ISO down to 100 and reduce the shutter speed accordingly.
For a 40D with a 200mm lens, the moon is only 300 pixels in diameter. The cheapest option for improvement would be to take multiple exposures and stack them in Registax.
If you can get 20 shots like that one, I think you'd get a pretty good result.

Steve.

Tripod, manual focus, live view?

This was what I used to be able to get on my 40D + 55-250:

1/500s, f/7.1, iso200

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SteveInNZ wrote in post #10855365
You have the headroom to drop the ISO down to 100 and reduce the shutter speed accordingly.
For a 40D with a 200mm lens, the moon is only 300 pixels in diameter. The cheapest option for improvement would be to take multiple exposures and stack them in Registax.
If you can get 20 shots like that one, I think you'd get a pretty good result.

Steve.

Interesting thought. I am going to try that as well as the other good advice you guys have given me. (also thanks for the Registax tip)

For the shot I used a tripod of course, I did not use live view. In fact in all the time I have had my 40D I have not used it. I will drop my ISO as mentioned and really look into where the 40D can help me, such as live view etc.

Also, don't expect a great deal when the moon is full, or nearly full. Best moon shots (I think) are anything less than about 60%-70% full, since you get all the craters and shadows around the terminator. Also makes Live View focusing easier when there are subjects like this in the image.

Just my 2p.

TekHouse wrote in post #10857548
Interesting thought. I am going to try that as well as the other good advice you guys have given me. (also thanks for the Registax tip)

For the shot I used a tripod of course, I did not use live view. In fact in all the time I have had my 40D I have not used it. I will drop my ISO as mentioned and really look into where the 40D can help me, such as live view etc.

Using live view to focus can be a huge help, especially when you use the zoom function of the live view to enlarge the image.

Good points about the moon being full.

And I never knew about live view zoom until you posted about it. So this has been a good topic for me. Learning a lot.

Thanks folks.

Yeah, I'm all over that zoom, because I only learned about it about 3 weeks ago, again from this forum.