Total Lunar Eclipse

[Frogfish 0]

Hey guys, on the night of Wed. Feb 20th, there will be a total lunar eclipse over N. America, the last one until Dec 2010.

 

The moon will turn different shades or red, and possible turquoise.

I'll be dusting of my CCD camera to capture it. Hopefully it still works.

 

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/13....htm?list969892

 

BTW, if you guys like this kind of stuff, if astrophotography is your thing, sign up to Spaceweather bulletins. They send bulletins right to your email regarding eclipses, comets, alignments, sunspot activity, and possible auroras.

[day5 0]

What is a CCD camera?

[Frogfish 0]

CCD is a charge-coupled device. It basically captures the image onto a light-sensitive CCD chip. When light photons strike the chip, it causes a change, and an image is left. Many CCD cameras are attached to telescopes.

 

I have a Meade DSI CCD and an LXD-75 10" Reflector telescope. I can post a picture of the setup...

 

CCD:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge-coupled_device

[ILikeFish 0]

CCD is what allows a digital camera to not have film...

[Frogfish 0]

My bad, my telescope is a LXD-55...

 

Here it is:

 

 

This black thing is the Meade DSI CCD Camera. It links to a computer to control it and view.

 

It goes directly on the eyepiece recepticle. I also have 3 barlow lenses and a teleconverter which it can go on.

[SW0352 0]

Anyone have suggestions on what settings to use on my D40 to capture some pics of this?

[benjamin 0]

im going to use my 400mm 3.5f shooting i cant wait ive been waiting for this for about a month i cant wait.

 

 

 

for your d40, your going to have to play with it, and experiment (thats the joy of shooting digital)

sorry i cant help

[Peterjay 0]

Froggy, that's a great looking scope.

[Wulff 0]

Shane its going to depend on how bright the moon is and what lens your using.

Chances are you want to be on a tripod but so long as your SS is fast enough you can handlhold.

If it not bright moon you might need ISO 400 or more and SSs around 1/100th or lower.

 

If it is a bright moon then you might get away with a lower ISO.

For &^%s and giggles after readingyour question I went out and took a quick because the moon is bright.

 

Handheld

Spot metered

ISO 400

F 8.0

1/500th

560mm

cropped some

 

[SW0352 0]

Thanks Wulff. The biggest lens I have right now is the 55-200mm f/4-5.6G, so I won't get anywhere near as close a shot as yours.

 

I was hoping to play around with it the last couple nights but it's been cloudy and rainy, so no moon, stars, sun or anything here. Hopefully I'll get a chance or two before Wednesday.

[Frogfish 0]

Handheld John?!?!?

 

WTF, you must have hands of steel! Especially at 560mm! How did you get that? 400mm+teleconverter?

[Wulff 0]

Lol Frogfish.

Yeah it was handheld. 400mm +1.4 TC (560mm) on a 1.3 crop. So effectively 730mm or there abouts at 1/500th. As for how, lots and lots of practise.

 

I saw SWs request and wasnt sure exactly of the answer. Id just taken the dog for a walk and knew the moon was bright. Grabbed the camera stepped back outside and took a shot to get a feel for the settings for him.

 

SW try the following.

Set the camera to AV and set your fstop to f8

Set your ISO to 400 to start.

Tr to mkae sure your SS as a result is over 1/400th.

Depeinding on how bright the moon is you might need to raise (or lower) your ISO to do that. Once you have a SS of 1/400th at f8 take your shots.

 

Heres a larger version of the same shot.

 

[Ashby 0]

Hope you don't mind Wulff but I took a shot at using your set up, but made a couple changes to my ISO and SS.

 

Hand held (wanted to see if I could do it)

Spot metered

ISO 250

F/8.0

1/160th

300mm (480 with 1.6 crop)

 

I also cropped this one a bit. You have some awesome clarity on your photo Wulff. I hope you don't mind me putting one up after yours, just wanted to try it so I would know what to use come the 20th

 

Ashby

 

[Mokai 0]

Here is one I got last August..

 

I used a D40 with a 300mm lens..ISO 800, 1 40th of a second @ f/8

Tripod too..

 

[Wulff 0]

Not at all Ashby. If people get an idea of how to do it or what to expect than all the better.

 

Handholding.

The longer your focal length the more difficult it is to handhold and get crisp shots. Its no different than trying to hit a bullseye with a rifle mounted with a high powered scope standing vs prone vs on a bi-pod/sandbag. Any small movement on your part is magnified by the strength of the scope. Wih long lenses the movement only need be typical tremors.

 

That also leads to camera shake. Same kind of relationhsip as above but if your shutter speed isn't fast enough to overide your shakes and tremors you get shots that arent sharp. Which Ashby I think is happening in yours. Camera shake doesnt manifiest itself as a completely blurred image (usually) but its the difference between a sharp crisp shot and a generally softer shot. Not the difference between a crip shot and a blurred image although if your SS is way tooooo slow then yes outright blurring will occur.

 

The General Rule of Thumb for the average person is 1/focal length.

So the average person will avoid Camera shake when their shutter speed is equal to, or greater than their focal length and further the longer the lens the more apparent it becomes. Meaning if two shots were sufferin from shake. Say where shot A was taken with a 200mm lens at 1/100th and shot b was taken with a 400mm at 1/200th the image taken with the 400 will look softer.

 

So long story short until your comfortable shooting long lenses you should always ensure that your SS is atleast 1.6 times higher (to account for crop factor) than the focal length of your lens.

 

Ive been doing this a long time and have taken tens of thousands of handheld images with my 400mm. These days, I can get away with Shuter speeds that are slower than my focal length. In this case 1/500th at 730mm but when I first started I had to be above the 1/ focal length.

 

The slower I am there more shots start getting soft but I do have shots that were taken with the 400mm as slow as 1/50th and 1/25th. Very rare those are though.

 

Back t the moon.

For those that arent sure you can see the difference its brightness is going to make. I was shooting at ISO 400 and 1/500th, Mokai was shooting at ISO 800 and1/40th. I wouldnt count on the moon being bright and you will need to bump ISOs, open lenses, lower shutters and will likely want to be on tripods.

 

If its visible here Im hoping to get some with stacked TCs so Im at 1,100mm or so.

 

/edit.

Ashby; Atmospherance haze is also likely another difference between them. Im up in Canada the colder the air, the clearer it tends to be, its the dead of winter up here Again the longer your focal length the more atmospherance haze will impact shots, especially clarity.