Moon photography

[daveinoz]

Seems like the full moon has sparked interest around here!

Without knowing anything of what I was doing tried some shots of the moon which came out a little blurry and certainly not as sharp as other I have seen but as I said I really was just guessing based on little or no knowledge re: settings.

I have a D5100 and a 70-300 lens that I was using. Could someone suggest the best ISO, aperture and fstop settings for a better moon shot?

Cheers

P.S. Read a blog somewhere that suggested ISO 200, F/11 and 1/250 but they were suggesting different settings for Nikon versus Canon and wasn't sure why?

And was using a tripod but not with delay settings so me pushing the trigger manually could have been some of the problem.

 

[cgipson1]

You can use standard sunny 16 exposures for the moon.. google it and you will see what I mean.

Or my favorite ISO100, F8, and a shutter anywhere from 1/60 to 1/250 depending how bright the moon is. You can spot meter on the moon and get a good metered exposure that way, if wanted. Just remember you will get more detail on a partial moon, the full moon has no crosslight to create shadows.



Tripod, and either a remote, or self timer.. highly recommended.

 

[unpopular]

Seriously. What is this place's obsession with the friggin' moon?

Even I jumped on that band wagon.

 

[pixmedic]

took this one last night.

View attachment 19158

 

[daveinoz]

GREAT photo - so much more detail than mine which was just flat and didn't really show any crater detail unlike yours why Tycho looks fantatstic. Thanks for the tips.

 

[cgipson1]

If you don't have a tripod, crank it up to ISO 400 / 800... you can shoot handheld, but try and get that shutter up to 1/500 minimum. Clarity might be an issue though....

Oh.. and that was a major crop! Shot on a D7000 with a 28-300 lens.

 

[cgipson1]

Seriously. What is this place's obsession with the friggin' moon?

Even I jumped on that band wagon.

Conformist!!!

 

[daveinoz]

If you don't have a tripod, crank it up to ISO 400 / 800... you can shoot handheld, but try and get that shutter up to 1/500 minimum. Clarity might be an issue though....

Oh.. and that was a major crop! Shot on a D7000 with a 28-300 lens.

Yep have a tripod but was using f5.6 and 1/400 without self timer or remote which could explain the cruddy outcome.

 

[KmH]

Since the Moon is about 250,000 miles away, controlling the depth-of-field is not an issue because it's effectively infinite both in front of and behind the Moon.

Use the lens aperture than gives the sharpest focus, which is often f/5.6 to f/8. Using a smaller aperture, like f/11 or f/16 may introduce some focus softening due to the negative effects of diffraction.

 

[Rwsphotos]

Well not an expert at these types of shots. Actually the one pixmedic posted is the first time we tried this. Tripod is a must and a remote would be very helpful. We used. Iso 200 I think f/4 varied the shutter speed here and there to see results. Anywhere from 1/640 to 1/800. I'm sure others here have different settings they find work for them. Also used our fixed focal 300 mm lens for the occasion.

 

[Rwsphotos]

Seriously. What is this place's obsession with the friggin' moon?

Even I jumped on that band wagon.

Well if you tried it too then where is the problem?

 

[orb9220]

Yep always been enthralled with the Moon from My caveman days


October "Harvest Moon" 3 of 3 (Full Crop) by Orbmiser, on Flickr

Awhile back when I tried. Was after 2am and first attempts handheld Moon shots. D90-Nikon 80-200 f2.8 AF-D with Tamron 1.4x. So ends up being 280mm Iso 200 f5 1/800th handheld through a window. Could have been better shooting at f8 and on a tripod and no window. And had to crop quite a bit to bring it closer. Times like these hanker for a Celestron C90 setup.
.

 

[unpopular]

Seriously. What is this place's obsession with the friggin' moon?

Even I jumped on that band wagon.

Well if you tried it too then where is the problem?

It was pretty unrewarding, really. One of the easiest shots I've ever taken. Granted IQ wasn't all that great due to the lens I was using. Kinda a "yep, it's the moon" kind of experience.

 

[cgipson1]

Well not an expert at these types of shots. Actually the one pixmedic posted is the first time we tried this. Tripod is a must and a remote would be very helpful. We used. Iso 200 I think f/4 varied the shutter speed here and there to see results. Anywhere from 1/640 to 1/800. I'm sure others here have different settings they find work for them. Also used our fixed focal 300 mm lens for the occasion.

While F4 would still give you more than adequate DOF, most lenses are not at their sharpest there. Unless you have the 2.8 version.. and even it will be sharper at F8! If you have the F4 version.. there are very few lenses sharpest wide open!

I understand you shoot professionally? I am surprised you don't have a remote already. Very handy!

 

[pixmedic]

Well not an expert at these types of shots. Actually the one pixmedic posted is the first time we tried this. Tripod is a must and a remote would be very helpful. We used. Iso 200 I think f/4 varied the shutter speed here and there to see results. Anywhere from 1/640 to 1/800. I'm sure others here have different settings they find work for them. Also used our fixed focal 300 mm lens for the occasion.

While F4 would still give you more than adequate DOF, most lenses are not at their sharpest there. Unless you have the 2.8 version.. and even it will be sharper at F8! If you have the F4 version.. there are very few lenses sharpest wide open!

I understand you shoot professionally? I am surprised you don't have a remote already. Very handy!

we do have a remote. and I left it on f/4 due to a lack of paying attention. left the remote and flashlight in the house. I got so fixated on the shutter speed that i wasn't really messing with much else. couldn't see crap outside in the dark...and yea, the remote is handy as hell for tripod shots.