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Re: [OM] Re: Lunar Eclipse

Subject: Re: [OM] Re: Lunar Eclipse
From: Roger Wesson <roger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2003 17:24:46 +0000
Did anyone else reply to this? It's a bit late now but lunar eclipses are not too infrequent. There are two next year, those of you in the Americas have one on October 28th, while Europeans, Asians, Africans and Australians are well placed for one in May:

http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/OH/OH2004.html

There are a few ways of photographing a lunar eclipse. Most straightforward is use a lens of reasonable focal length (400mm or longer) to get a reasonable sized-image of the moon. Exposure times for the partial phases are of the order of 1/500s at f/5.6 if I remember rightly, for ISO400 film. Totality requires longer exposures (4-8s) and I think it's probably marginal as to whether you can get a shot without any guiding.

Wide angle shots can be very nice, with an obviously red moon leaving much fainter stars visible than you'd normally see at full moon. With a 50mm lens, about 20s at widest aperture will give you a nice shot. Fast film is good - Fuji Superia 800 and Super HG 1600 are good choices.

Another possibility is to do a trail shot. Good if your skies are likely to stay clear for several hours! You need to have a reasonable idea of where the eclipse will be appearing in the sky, use as wide an angle lens as possible (28mm probably the maximum), and use a fairly small aperture and slow film for about a four hour exposure. You'll end up with a madly bright lunar trail diminishing to a dull red, then growing again as the moon leaves the earth's shadow.

Here's a good page of examples:

http://www.mreclipse.com/LEphoto/LEgallery1.html

It was very clear at the start of the eclipse in London but there was mist rising as it proceeded, and by totality the skies were blank, I took a few shots of the partial phases with my Vivitar 400/5.6 beast, haven't got them back yet.

Apologies for the belated reply, hope you tried some shots out and hope this might be useful for future eclipses!

Cheers,
Roger

Geilfuss Charles wrote:

Greetings All,
        I'm looking for suggestions on how best to photograph the upcoming
Lunar Eclipse (Nov. 8th). Thanks.

Charlie Geilfuss



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