Giant steps are...

Copy_Kot · 03-31-2007, 05:51 PM

... what you take
Walking on the moon
I hope my legs dont break
Walking on the moon
We could walk for ever
Walking on the moon
We could live together
Walking on, walking on the moon

Moon @ 600mm

cropped…

big baldo · 03-31-2007, 07:58 PM

Great song and pictures!!
I need to get out there and do that. The detail is spot on!

So how many tries did it take you to get it right?

Bevb · 04-01-2007, 01:34 AM

Copy, your photography has opened up to an array of different subjects recently, this is superb, and i agree with Big Baldo, superb song! (they have just reformed apparently as a group).
The cropped version is amazing.

Copy_Kot · 04-01-2007, 06:01 AM

Thank you Big Baldo and Bev.

Big Baldo, surprizingly, it didn't take too many tries. The hardest thing was seeing my camera settings in the dark. I took the image using a tripod and my settings were: Shutter speed 1/60th, ISO 100, Aperture f/11.

If the sky is clear tonight I'll try it again, I have to go look for my Police CD now (lol)... I can't get that song out of my head. They are one of the very few groups I would pay money to see if I had the chance.

**Loupey** · 04-01-2007, 07:48 AM

Excellent job, Copy! I think it is the sharpest version that I've seen.

Who needs a telescope when you have a 600mm and an APS-C sensor! I recently bought a telescope but you can't really appreciate the images from it like you can a well captured image (IMO).

Copy_Kot · 04-01-2007, 10:28 AM

Thank you Loupey, I can't understand why people just watch birds and not try to get an image, lol.

I just read on the net that the best time to shoot the moon is when it is either 1/4 or 3/4 full, you will get the most detail out of the craters then.

Copy_Kot · 04-02-2007, 06:25 PM

Here's a shot from tonight, it had an orange glow to it...

Jaedon · 04-03-2007, 07:19 AM

I wish I had taken my camera with me to work this morning. At 5:20am here the sky was perfectly black and the moon had 2 stellar friends nearby that immediately made me think "Second star to the left and straight on till morning" =)

Nice shots CK. The detail is outstanding.

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 08:40 AM

Thank you Jaedon

karen m. · 04-03-2007, 10:43 AM

Congrats on your featured photo

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 10:57 AM

Thank you Karen

Wow... very cool

SpeedingSphere · 04-03-2007, 11:12 AM

When you take photos, you can make the moon appear sharper with a higher shutter speed vs aperture. The moon is so distant, it appears as a 2D object in the sky with little to no depth. Use F/5.6 or whatever your lowest is, and bump up that shutter speed to reduce vibrations. It will be a good deal sharper. I also find focusing on the moon with my second eye open helps relax my "focusing" eye and I am able to grab more detail with manual focus. With your other eye, make sure you have something black to look at, or even make something to cover it with if you dont have a black area to look at. I just use the sky, but sometimes light is reflecting off of other objects such as cars or trees.

Great photo! get one every night of the month and make a .gif, that would be superb! :-)

**ps, what lens did you use?

Bevb · 04-03-2007, 11:29 AM

Yes BIG Congrats Copy!
Would'nt it be great if the Police used this picture on their reformed group CD, when it comes out.

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 11:35 AM

Thank you SpeedingSphere, I used my Canon 300mm f/4L and 2X TC for both images. I think my s/s for the first image was around 1/100th of a second, and I used mirror lockup for the second image... don't remember the shutter speed.

I was just reading that the moon shouldn't be shot low in the sky, like the second image was, because you are focusing through more of the 'garbage' in the Earths atmosphere. It's better to take an image when the moon is high (less garbage to fight through, lol).

I also read that people who are really into astrophotography use very slow shutter speeds... something between 3 and 5 minutes. They use a tracking device mounted on their tripods to compensate for the Earths rotation... I can't imagen how much something like that cost.

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 11:35 AM

LOL, thank you Bev.

SpeedingSphere · 04-03-2007, 12:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Copy_Kot

I also read that people who are really into astrophotography use very slow shutter speeds... something between 3 and 5 minutes. They use a tracking device mounted on their tripods to compensate for the Earths rotation... I can't imagen how much something like that cost.

3-5 mins on a tracker can be used for star photography and photographing galaxies with an IR sensitive camera. This isnt needed for the moon. Also, that is very true about the moon. It does come out sharper when being shot upwards due to less atmospheric interference. I recall a time I shot the moon and I had the camera completely vertical. it was so hard to get my eye under the viewfinder to focus it. picture came out excellent though. Thats proof to me that it looks better shooting straight up, but its something I'll avoid in the future, lol.. too hard on the neck.

Knight · 04-03-2007, 03:39 PM

Congrats on the Featured Photo Copy , well deserved

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 04:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpeedingSphere

3-5 mins on a tracker can be used for star photography and photographing galaxies with an IR sensitive camera. This isnt needed for the moon.

Now that I think of it... I'm not sure the moon was mentioned at all in what I read.

And thank you Knight.

big baldo · 04-03-2007, 04:27 PM

Congrats on the featured photo!!!!

Im going to have to work on my moon shooting skills!(no pun intended

)

**Loupey** · 04-03-2007, 06:06 PM

From what I've read/learned about astrophotography, Copy and SpeedingSphere, you're both right.

A camera mounted onto a telescope with autotracking controls would be necessary for looong exposures to render the faintest of objects. Not applicable for such a bright object such as the moon.

If I were to try a moon shot, I would also use a higher shutter speed and stop down just 1 stop from max to get good resolution/detail at "moon noon".

Great examples, Copy!

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 06:21 PM

Thank you Big Baldo and Loupey.

Loupey, that seems about right... they also use really high ISO speeds for astrophotography, the results of doing it the right way (not talk'n about the moon) are just incredible! I tried getting an image of some stars tonight, and even with a shutter speed of about one minute you get 'star trails'. I've been looking through my B&H catalog and they have a lot of the gadgets used for this... just what I need, a new hobby (lol).

Oh and BTW, you really do not need a very long focal length to get some good images. I saw a shot of Saturn taken at something like 230mm that was awesome!

SpeedingSphere · 04-03-2007, 07:03 PM

you have the link? That sounds like a shot worthy to look at. I cant imagine you'd see detail in it. hrm.

I have some star shots too, my 400mm (640mm on APS-C) catches a full uncropped shot of the 7 sisters. I have it in my gallery. Its quite blurry, but its cool none the less. The most fun thing to shoot is the entire sky with the north star in the middle. No star trails on the north star, and everything around it moves. Wide angle to get some horizon and the sky. Very cool.

If I get the Sigma 8mm, I may purchase a Canon film body for the full frame view and take a 180* shot of the area and sky, camera pointed vertical. Should come out very nicely.

I wish we had an astrophotography section. It doesnt quite fit into "nature", but more "outer-space".. Oh the wishes.. lol.. it'd be nice to see a compiled forum of sky photos.

Copy_Kot · 04-03-2007, 08:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpeedingSphere

you have the link?

Ummmm, I do a little too much web surfing sometimes

Unless I bookmark something right away I usually forget where I saw it. Here are the last three astrophotography sites from my 'history.' I can't tell you which one had the image, but all three sites are worth checking out (I'll search for the image some more).

http://www.astropix.com/HTML/I_ASTROP/TOC_AP.HTM

http://www.rc-astro.com/

http://skytonight.com/howto/astropho...y/3304331.html

And I agree about an astrophotography section... that would be really cool! If you do a Google search, you can see that a lot of people are interested in it.

Copy_Kot · 04-04-2007, 07:08 AM

SpeedingSphere, I was up half the night looking for that image

and couldn't find the same exact one. I'm starting to think I saw something like a galaxy that was in the shape of Saturn... there's plenty of them on the net taken at lower focal lengths

I'll keep looking.

edit- Hallelujah! I found the site

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgu...%3Den%26sa%3DN

It was taken with a "cheap 70mm telescope," I don't know where I got 200-- something. Some of the stuff on the website/blog is in German... which I no understand lol.

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