Monday, September 28, 2015

Moonshine... or rather, lack thereof

Did you see it last night? The blood moon eclipse? It was so nice that it was at a reasonable hour for watching and taking photos, rather than in the middle of the night, although I have been known to be up taking pics at that ridiculous time, too. 

I almost didn't get to see it, due to clouds coming and going. Here are a couple of practice shots that I took before the eclipse started, just to get the feel for camera settings.



Then as the eclipse was starting, it got cloudy, so I missed the beginning of it, but thankfully the clouds left long enough for me to get the rest of these shots. I didn't bother with the tripod, so I was kneeling on the deck with the camera braced on the railing to hold it still enough for the long exposure time. I'll just say my knees were a little stiff when I got back up again. ;)





That was all I got before it got covered over with clouds again. It was fun while it lasted. Sometime I'd like to invest in a really good zoom lens for even better shots! Maybe.

6 comments:

LiEr said...

Lovely pics! The fourth one is my favorite!

We sat on our driveway with the tripod (D) and binoculars (L) and watched, too. Then I got distracted by the stars, and was reminded of how beautiful they are here in North America. Back in Singapore, there is too much atmospheric interference - the city lights and the wretched haze, for instance, to fully appreciate the stars most nights.

It's funny how the camera managed to capture the bloody hues of the eclipse but it merely looked foggy-cobwebby grey through the binoculars.

Have a wonderful week!

L

Anonymous said...

I appreciate the great photos. It was cloudy here so no visible super moon with eclipse at our house. Thanks.
Ellen

Jenny said...

Nice photos. My husband got out our telescope out (not a super fancy one, but a decent starter model) after I woke up my 5th grader (as promised) to see the peak of the eclipse. I tried taking some pictures through the telescope with my iphone (just held it up to the eyepiece) and they actually turned out surprisingly well! I'll try to post a couple to my blog.

Jenny

Grandma G said...

Thank you all! And you're welcome, Ellen. Not that there weren't a bazillion other pics of it all online. ;)

LiEr, that 4th one has me puzzled. At first I thought it was between 2 evergreen trees, but then I realized I couldn't have done that from where I knelt. It must've just been a rather strange cloud in front of the moon, which I couldn't even see with the naked eye in the darkness.

Jenny, your photos turned out great!

Geneviève said...

Great pictures! I love how we can see the progression of the eclipse.

I think that fourth photo is kinda mesmerizing too. Whatever caused that, it is pretty cool!

Grandma G said...

Thank you, my friend! :)