Full Moon next weekend.

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alphasha

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sharon
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Does anyone have any plans and tips for getting a good picture of the moon on the 19th?
It is going to be at its closest to earth for over 20 years and as a result will appear brighter and larger.
I would love to be able to get some shots of this and as I live out in the sticks with little light polution some stars shooting or otherwise during the star showers later in the year.
I have nikon d5000 what sort of settings etc would be best?
Thanks guys
 
Full moon is the worst time to shoot (apart from a new moon). Because the sunlight is striking the front of the moon all the shadows are invisible to the camera and most of the texture and detail disappears. The best time to shoot is with a partial moon, when the sunlight rakes across the surface, creating highlights on the edges of craters and shadows in and behind them.

Here's an example. Note how the craters are well defined at the transition between light and dark. The part of the moon to the left, which has the sun angled to fill in all shadows appears featureless by comparison. A full moon will look as uninteresting as the left hand side of this shot....

20090812_003105_1552_LR.jpg


As for settings, "Moony 11" would be a good starting point. Using manual exposure set the exposure to f/11, 200 ISO, 1/200. Use a tripod and a remote or timer release, to minimise camera shake, and focus using Live View if you have the option. Adjust to taste. Good luck.
 
Like Tim says, Full Moon is the worst time to try to photograph it. And next week's Full Moon will be indistinguishable from any other, unless you've got some decent measuring equipment.

You'd be much better off getting out sometime over the next few days. Oh, and you'll need a big telephoto lens. This is an uncropped image taken at with a 300mm lens with 2x and 1.4x TCs for a total of 840mm.

Moon%20840mm.jpg
 
Thanks guys I will hope for a clear night before saturday now.
 
The fact that the moon will be a couple of thousand kilometres closer than normal will probably be all but indescernible in a photograph of it. If you want to make the moon look bigger and a lot closer, use a longer telephoto lens.
 
At least it would make for some impressive night time long exposure landscape photography!
Also bear in mind the "supermoon" will make for some extreme spring tides around coastal areas over that weekend. With diurnal ranges of up to 8.5 metres, that's bound to reveal some hidden photography treasures. Might be worth noting down the low and high tides times for your area and then venturing down to the seaside.
 
Tim and Frank are right (as usual). Full moon is the worst time for photographing it.

The variations in the moon's size aren't enormous, but they are perhaps bigger than some people think. When the moon is full at perigee (closest approach) it is about 13% larger in apparent diameter and 30% brighter than when it's full at apogee (furthest point in its orbit).

If you're interested in this there's a very good reference source here: Inconstant Moon.
 
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I reckon I'll be trying a few shots in the days before and after full and maybe a couple of moonlit landscapes on the 19th.
 
For people that want to know just what to expect from this spectacular event, I've prepared an accurate simulation. Here's what the Moon should look like on Saturday and, for comparison, the tiny Full Moon we can expect in April.

Supermoon.jpg



Honestly, that's a pretty accurate rendition of the difference - about 0.6%.
 
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