Moon shots

Hey All

For the lunar eclipse, I was set up with my D70, 70-300 4-5.6 nikkor,
and a tripod. I opened up the aperture to the best I could at max zoom,
though I left the ISO lower so I didn't have to deal with noise (in
hindsight, that decision sucked).

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and I
had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

So.. Barring a higher ISO setting(and spending $ on a better lens :P ),
is there anything I could have done to improve focus quality?

I'm thinking I could possibly have moved to a faster lens (50mm 1.8) but
then the crop factor needed to get a reasonable shot would have come
into play?

All thoughts appreciated.


TIA
P.

"Pboud" wrote in message
news:bRhzj.62836$w57.56507@edtnps90...
Hey All

For the lunar eclipse, I was set up with my D70, 70-300 4-5.6 nikkor, and
a tripod. I opened up the aperture to the best I could at max zoom, though
I left the ISO lower so I didn't have to deal with noise (in hindsight,
that decision sucked).

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and I
had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

So.. Barring a higher ISO setting(and spending $ on a better lens :P ),
is there anything I could have done to improve focus quality?

I'm thinking I could possibly have moved to a faster lens (50mm 1.8) but
then the crop factor needed to get a reasonable shot would have come into
play?

All thoughts appreciated.


TIA
P.

What ISO setting did you use?

Rudy Benner wrote:
"Pboud" wrote in message
news:bRhzj.62836$w57.56507@edtnps90...
Hey All

For the lunar eclipse, I was set up with my D70, 70-300 4-5.6 nikkor, and
a tripod. I opened up the aperture to the best I could at max zoom, though
I left the ISO lower so I didn't have to deal with noise (in hindsight,
that decision sucked).

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and I
had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

So.. Barring a higher ISO setting(and spending $ on a better lens :P ),
is there anything I could have done to improve focus quality?

I'm thinking I could possibly have moved to a faster lens (50mm 1.8) but
then the crop factor needed to get a reasonable shot would have come into
play?

All thoughts appreciated.


TIA
P.

What ISO setting did you use?


It never moved off of 200, giving me 7-10 sec exposures (hence the soft
focus)

did I mention that particular decision sucked? The shoot was a spur of
the moment thing and I didn't think to play with the ISO since I seldom
move it off of 200 (mainly still photo)

Live and learn :P

P.

Pboud wrote:
Rudy Benner wrote:
"Pboud" wrote in message
news:bRhzj.62836$w57.56507@edtnps90...
Hey All

For the lunar eclipse, I was set up with my D70, 70-300 4-5.6 nikkor,
and a tripod. I opened up the aperture to the best I could at max
zoom, though I left the ISO lower so I didn't have to deal with noise
(in hindsight, that decision sucked).

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and
I had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

So.. Barring a higher ISO setting(and spending $ on a better lens :P
), is there anything I could have done to improve focus quality?

I'm thinking I could possibly have moved to a faster lens (50mm 1.8)
but then the crop factor needed to get a reasonable shot would have
come into play?

All thoughts appreciated.


TIA
P.

What ISO setting did you use?

It never moved off of 200, giving me 7-10 sec exposures (hence the soft
focus)

did I mention that particular decision sucked? The shoot was a spur of
the moment thing and I didn't think to play with the ISO since I seldom
move it off of 200 (mainly still photo)

Live and learn :P

Yeah, go ahead & crank up the ISO for an eclipse & maybe even stop down
(do a lot of bracketing).

Roger Clark laid out some math that came up with 1/8 second for 400mm on
a D70 in this recent discussion:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.p...de4a69335552fc
But that assumes perfect visibility with no atmosphere & a flawless lens
so experiment with that in mind. For 300mm & a bright moon (no eclipse)
you probably don't need to raise the ISO but the eclipsed moon is much
darker than a lit moon. I managed so-so results with 2 seconds in the
2007 eclipse:
http://edgehill.net/Misc/misc-photos...eclipse/pg1pc3
You can experiment with the dark side of a new moon:
http://edgehill.net/Misc/moon/pg2pc9

On Wed, 05 Mar 2008 06:14:13 GMT, Paul Furman
wrote:
Yeah, go ahead & crank up the ISO for an eclipse & maybe even stop down
(do a lot of bracketing).

Roger Clark laid out some math that came up with 1/8 second for 400mm on
a D70 in this recent discussion:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.p...de4a69335552fc
But that assumes perfect visibility with no atmosphere & a flawless lens
so experiment with that in mind. For 300mm & a bright moon (no eclipse)
you probably don't need to raise the ISO but the eclipsed moon is much
darker than a lit moon. I managed so-so results with 2 seconds in the
2007 eclipse:

Here's my attempt at the recent full eclipse. Nikon D200, Sigma
70-300 DG APO F4-5.6 at 300mm, 1 second, ISO400, f/8:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sss_ran...51713/sizes/o/

You can definitely see some motion blur. Looking back, I should have
cranked up the ISO to 800, opened up the aperture a stop and that
would have given me a speed of 1/4 sec for the same exposure. I just
thought 1 second would be fast enough and it didn't look bad on the
LCD screen of the camera. By the time I loaded it onto the PC it was
too late. Oh well, next time.

The full moon after the eclipse was much easier. Here's 300mm, 1/200
second, ISO100, f/11:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sss_ran...37410/sizes/o/

Steve

Paul Furman wrote:
Pboud wrote:
Rudy Benner wrote:
"Pboud" wrote in message
news:bRhzj.62836$w57.56507@edtnps90...
Hey All

For the lunar eclipse, I was set up with my D70, 70-300 4-5.6
nikkor, and a tripod. I opened up the aperture to the best I could
at max zoom, though I left the ISO lower so I didn't have to deal
with noise (in hindsight, that decision sucked).

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising
and I had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

So.. Barring a higher ISO setting(and spending $ on a better lens
:P ), is there anything I could have done to improve focus quality?

I'm thinking I could possibly have moved to a faster lens (50mm 1.8)
but then the crop factor needed to get a reasonable shot would have
come into play?

All thoughts appreciated.


TIA
P.

What ISO setting did you use?

It never moved off of 200, giving me 7-10 sec exposures (hence the
soft focus)

did I mention that particular decision sucked? The shoot was a spur of
the moment thing and I didn't think to play with the ISO since I
seldom move it off of 200 (mainly still photo)

Live and learn :P

Yeah, go ahead & crank up the ISO for an eclipse & maybe even stop down
(do a lot of bracketing).

Roger Clark laid out some math that came up with 1/8 second for 400mm on
a D70 in this recent discussion:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.p...de4a69335552fc

But that assumes perfect visibility with no atmosphere & a flawless lens
so experiment with that in mind. For 300mm & a bright moon (no eclipse)
you probably don't need to raise the ISO but the eclipsed moon is much
darker than a lit moon. I managed so-so results with 2 seconds in the
2007 eclipse:
http://edgehill.net/Misc/misc-photos...eclipse/pg1pc3
You can experiment with the dark side of a new moon:
http://edgehill.net/Misc/moon/pg2pc9
Many thanks! I'll check out the thread and start playing a bit


P.

The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and I
had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

Here's some inspiration:

http://ncarboni.home.att.net/Astrophotography.html

Doug wrote:
The shots, while clear, were soft focus since the moon was rising and I
had to follow with the camera, adjusting every minute or so.

Here's some inspiration:

http://ncarboni.home.att.net/Astrophotography.html


Very, very nice

Thks
P.