Hi folks,
Well, I hadn't tried photographing the moon (started to say "shooting
the moon" but decided not to risk the abuse <grin>) since the mid
seventies. That was with an OM-1 and a cheap 1200mm telescope. But
the combination of the eclipse last night, the E330 and Zuiko 300/4.5
gave me the inspiration to try it again.
I think that the sweet spot of the 300 is around f11 but I thought
that might not work well with the small sensor of the 330 so I used
f8 instead. Live view B was used for all the shots - I focused
using the 10x zoom, took a test shot, downloaded it and checked the
focus on the computer screen. I left the focus at that point and
went back to the 1x view for framing the balance of the shots. I
found that the lens will focus past infinity so my adapter may be a bit thin.
The forecast was for cloudy conditions but things were relatively
clear when I first started shooting. Here's a shot taken at 8:10PM
EST when the moon was in the prenumbral stage of the eclipse (1/80 @ f8):
<http://home.alltel.net/jjohnso4/Eclipse01.jpg>
As the eclipse progressed light to heavy clouds started moving
through. Even when there weren't visible clouds in front of the moon
there was a lot of moisture in the atmosphere that hampered the
seeing. This next shoot was taken at 9:01 PM EST (1/40 @f8):
<http://home.alltel.net/jjohnso4/Eclipse01.jpg>
Another shot taken at 9:27PM EST (1/10 @ f8):
<http://home.alltel.net/jjohnso4/Eclipse11.jpg>
As totality neared I found that my exposure times were
increasing. Also about this time, the quality of the pictures went
to heck. I need to do some research to refresh my memory as to when
blurring due to exposure times becomes a factor when photographing
the moon. There's also the possibility that I bumped the focus ring
on the lens and, by this time, the atmosphere was loaded with
moisture. This last shot was at 9:47PM EST (1 sec @ f8):
<http://home.alltel.net/jjohnso4/Eclipse12.jpg>
Overall the live view on the E330 was fun to use - maybe a little
better than a normal DSLR with a right angle finder. However, during
totality I couldn't see the moon on the LCD. I didn't bother to try
the live view boost to see if that would have worked any better.
Looking back I wish that I had taped the focus ring down once I had
infinity focus confirmed. I also wish that I had tried some higher
ISOs than 100 and some bracketed shots for HDR processing. All in
all it was a fun 90 minutes though.
(Comments on the pictures are welcomed.)
Later,
Johnny
__________________________
Johnny Johnson
Cleveland, GA
mailto:jjohnso4@xxxxxxxxxx
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