As you all can tell from the previous post, I shot the moon last night, well not just the moon but a total lunar eclipse. It was a late night, and a long, tired day at work today, but it was worth the loss of sleep to shoot a rarely available subject, the eclipsed moon. The following explains the methods, settings and gear I used for the shoot and some general tips for moon and night sky photography.
Since there are probably hundreds of sites out there explaining moon photoography, I’ll keep this part as short as possible . The single most important thing to think about when ’shooting the moon’ is camera stability. Without a completely stable camera, your shots will come out blurry and unimpressive, but with a few simple tools that should already be in your kit, and a some basic methods, getting sharp moon images is actually quite simple. The tools you will need aside from Your DSLR:
Essential Gear
A sturdy tripod A staple to any DSLR kit, and required for stable night photography at low ISO speeds. Try to get one with a quick-release and adjustable head. (I use a Bogen Manfrotto 30001N Tripod with 804RC2 3-way pan/tilt head.Shop for yours on Amazon )
A shutter release cable Imperative to eliminate camera shake when the shutter button is pressed, but you could use the self-timer in a pinch.(wired or wireless - I use the off-brand Dot Line variety and it works great, but make sure you get one with a bulb exposure option. Shop for yours on Amazon)
A telephoto lens A zoom or prime, but for the moon I suggest a minimum zoom of 300mm.
(I use the inexpensive Canon EF 75-300 f/4-5.6. Shop for yours on Amazon)
A camera with "mirror-lockup" funtionality This one isn’t absolutely required, but it does eliminate any mirror/shutter movement related camera vibrations and ensure maximum stability.
So you have the gear together, now comes the fun part…
I decided to stay up late and catch the lunar eclipse. The picture above is the fully eclipsed moon as of 2:52 AM or so. I’ll post again tomorrow with a full series of images and a breakdown of the methods I used, but to summarize: I shot at f/11 at varying ISOs & shutter speeds with my “cheapie long” EF 75-300 f/4-5.6 with a remote shutter release cable, mirror lock-up enabled, using EOS utility while directly wired to my laptop. I played with some time lapse shooting as well. Stay tuned for the full write-up tomorrow.
Tech-blogger Glenn Wolsey has posted an insightful article on the timeless prime vs. zoom lens debate. He does a great job explaining the differences, and benefits of each in different situations. Check it out!
It’s a very busy times for the major DSLR manufacturers, as Nikon has now launched 2 new DSLRs, the D3 and D300 directly after Canon’s launch of the the new 40D and 1Ds Mark III. Nikon has definitely upped their game with their first FX or full-frame DSLR in the D3, the successor to the pro-level D2. It inlcudes ridiculously high ISO sensitivity and The D300 also boast very impressive improvements over the D200. To see the full specs of both, I’ve included links to several sites covering both cameras.
Via UK website techdigest.com. One of their contributors caught up with Steve, a Development Consultant at Canon, who gave them a brief video run-through of the 40D’s standout new features.
After a long hiatus, here I am back with some hot review action for your pleasure. My first (but I assure you not my last) Canon “L” lens review is about the Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L. Ryan wrote earlier about his first “L” lens, and I must say that my experience emotionally mirrored his a great deal when this arrived from B&H. It was the first “L” I owned, and it is to date my favorite lens that I have used.
Finally Canon has officially announced the new 40D DSLR with pretty much the same specs we reported on in recent weeks, but that’s not all!!! They also announced the ridiculousli high-res, 21 Megapixel 1Ds Mark III pro DSLR. Now if they could only get around to announcing the successor to the 5D…
Via Gizmodo, it seems Amazon mistakenly released a pre-order page with the full 40D specs. The list is wayyyy too long to list here, but some key info: Release date September 20th, 10.1 MP, 6.5 FPS, 3 inch LCD with LiveView, Digic 3.
Those geniuses at O’Reilly Digital Media are at it again with a post on retouching night skies. The article shows a quick and simple method to add impact to your night sky shots.
An excellent article has been posted describing methods to completely eliminate noise from your digital photos. The article, posted at guillermoluijk.com though long, is incredibly informative on methods for reducing noise. This is the first time I’ve come across this site, which seems to have a lot more good articles, unfortunately for me, most of them are in Spanish.
From OnTakingPictures via Thomas Hawk, photographer Bill Wadman goes into why he would take a quality lens and cheap camera over expensive camera and cheapie lens in any situation. I can’t even remember how many times I’ve had this conversation with people when they ask me for advice on what camera or lens to buy.
He is pretty much spot on with everything he is saying and this quote about says it all: “I saw a girl with a high-end Gitzo tripod, 5D body, and some crappy consumer level zoom lens on the front. Honestly, I almost pushed her over the edge.” …as you should have! Check it out here.
Found from our friends over at Digg, there’s an excellent post at Lifehacker that you really, really want to read if you own a Canon point an shoot. I won’t spoil everything, but the short of it is that there’s free, non-volatile, hacked firmware that can add tons and tons of useful features (RAW shooting, to top the list) to your kit. You really want to read this. Like now.
Via Photography Bay, it seems Canon’s German site posted some information for a short period of time, and though its in German, looks like 16 MP and due in June. We’ve been expecting an announcement around April 22nd or 24th from other rumors. More details as we get them. Check out the story and more screenshots here.
Update: Obviously nothing happened on either the 22nd or 24th… I’m not at all happy about it… I want my 5D Mark II dammit! We will of course keep you updated with any new developments.
Via Engadget, Crunchgear and DPReview… it seem some super code geniuses have dissected the just-released Nikon D3 firmware update and found some information that led them to believe that a 24.4 Megapixel camera, presumably the D3x is on the way.
. The single most important thing to think about when ’shooting the moon’ is camera stability. Without a completely stable camera, your shots will come out blurry and unimpressive, but with a few simple tools that should already be in your kit, and a some basic methods, getting sharp moon images is actually quite simple. The tools you will need aside from Your DSLR:)
