Lunar Eclipse Tomorrow (Saturday)

[Chris Dodkin]

Heads up to the California and Australian contingents:

The eclipse will begin at 3:33 a.m. PST, when the faint outer penumbral shadow touches the moon. The eclipse will be obvious by 4:45 a.m., when the dark umbral shadow begins its trip across the moon's face. The total eclipse phase will start at 6:06 a.m. and last for 51 minutes.

In Sydney, the eclipse will begin at 10:33 p.m. Saturday evening and last most of the night. Totality is from 1:06 a.m. until 1:57 a.m. local time.

It's difficult to predict in advance how dark any particular lunar eclipse will be. It’s extremely rare for the moon to disappear completely because some sunlight always leaks past the Earth through the twilight zones.

Because this light is coming from countless sunsets on Earth, it is usually tinged reddish in color. If cloud cover on Earth is dense, very little light gets through, and we get a very dark eclipse.

Because this eclipse will be low in the western sky in North America and low in the south in Australia, there should be plenty of photo opportunities

I will be up bright and early Saturday (weather permitting) to see what I can get

 

[Brian Moore]

Thanks, Chris. Tomorrow's EPL games don't start until 7:00 am Pacific Time, so maybe I'll drag my 7D and my Tamron 18-270 down to the shore for a snap or two.

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Some excellent advice here on shooting a lunar eclipse: How to Photograph a Lunar Eclipse

 

[Milan Vjestica]

Thanks Chris,I just got back from Europe so Jet Lag may work against me........I'll probably fall asleep at 9pm and then wake up at about 2:30 am!

 

[Thomas brookes]

Awwww you guys get all the fun the moon we have in England is pretty boring and I'm pretty sure is made out of cheese. Wish we had the American moon or the Australian moon. It always amazes me how the moons never bump into one another.... The mind boggles! Enjoy!!

 

[Pete Askew]

That's not a moon Dan, that's a boiling sphere of blood. It's the end of the world I tell you. The end of the world!!

 

[Brodie Jackson]

Wait.. when will it be happening in aus? or have i already missed it? :/ lol

 

[Pete Askew]

BBC News - Skywatchers enjoy lunar eclipse

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Just after 5am here, and it's started. Sky is clear, and a bright moon is getting swallowed by a huge dragon, or something!Heading out in a minute to a good vantage point. Camera gear is already outside cooling down to avoid condensation. Looks like it should be spectacular, and bloody freezing!

 

[Dan Cattermole]

That's not a moon Dan

Hang on a minute, I know we're both wearing a gas masks in our avatar..........

 

[Pete Askew]

Oops, sorry Dan. Should have noticed the lack of Russian front filter mask!!

 

[Dan Cattermole]

Hahaha!!!!

 

[Thomas brookes]

Haha.... Patrick referred to me as dan in another post I was going to sabotage your good name until you pointed it out. Apparently a couple of years back an American and a couple of his mates flew to the American moon and put a flag in it and drove around in a go kart.

 

[Pete Askew]

The things these American kids get up to for a laugh, eh?!! You'd have thought it would have burst!

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Here we go chaps - best effort with the 5D2 and 1200mm of L lens goodness (600 f4 and the Canon 2x)

Dragon clearly swallowing the moon

Last rays of the sun

Set up on the patio with a comfy chair and some warm clothing!

Lack of light required high ISO, so may have another play with some decent noise reduction software to reduce the noise.

Focus was a nightmare - so dim it was impossible to use Live Mode AF, so had to go manual!

Used a remote release and live mode (mirror locked up) to keep it all stable.

 

[Pete Askew]

What?!! Not Hand held!! You wimp!!

Nice shots though, especially the eclipse one (you can eve see where they fixed it after those kids stuck the flag pole in!).

What ISO / shutter speed did you use in the end?

 

[Chris Dodkin]

ISO 5000 - fll - 1/4 sec for the Eclipse shot

Didn't want to go too long on shutter speed, and get blur due to the moon moving in frame

Was advised that you wanted f11 to have a shot at some of the detail on the lunar surface

 

[Thomas brookes]

Wow!! Awesome Chris second shot is ace!!!!

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Thanks Tom - after the eclipse was at near full effect, the light level of the moon dropped, and the sky was getting bright as twilight kicked-in, so I was done at that point.

So the last few shots of the sunlight on the edge of the moon were the best all round.

Had to go +1/3 stop on exposure to pull the shaded area up, loosing any detail in the lit section of course.

Might run it through Topaz later and see what I can get out of it with some of their HDR type settings

 

[Brian Moore]

Smashin foties, Chris. #2 is really good. (Never got any myself, due to a late night and red plonk, which induced a coma out of which I did not emerge until daylight this am.)