Nice!

Yeah, but where did the missing part of the moon go? We have to know!

It fell off because it used to be upside down. Then the other side was the heavier side and that side spun to the bottom, now it's upside down. Pretty soon there won't be any moon left!

9:01

it grew back!


phenomenal shots

Sure, didn't Princess Lenore tell you it would?

Who's to judge?

(I'll wait, but it might be a long one)

dmg, is the fair over and has the jury decided?

I wasn't going to bring it up after all of the posting I did on it, but there was a snafu. I went up that night to enter them and I missed the fact that you had to pre-register by August 1st. I thought that was for displays like farm equipment, livestock, etc. No...it was for EVERYTHING. So, my oversight cost me entering them.

At least I know for next year. I was quite bummed. Thanks for asking though. :(

Yes, but well played anyway. :notworthy

I knew I could count on you, Bruce.

I played around with the settings and got some better photos of the moon on Saturday night using the digital zoom. They are as they came from the camera...no cropping or other alteration. On the first, I think I should have maybe bumped the ISO up one or two because the image is a bit bright and yellow-ish, not the sharp white it should be. But cool nonetheless. The second was not zoomed quite as much and I think I may have changed something because it is a bit whiter.



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2311.jpg


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2313.jpg

That is fantastic jinx! Do you use the same setting each time or experiment based on the amount of light due to moon phase?

Nice! great shots, both of you.

The moon's reflectivity is constant. IIRC it reflects about 9% of the light falling on it. Your settings shouldn't change unless you are compensating for haze.

The "Rule of f:16" from the days of film states that proper exposure for a subject in full sun (between the hours of 10am and 4pm, May-Sept) is f:16 with a shutter speed of 1/ISO.

So, on a typical sunny summer day (excluding the beach) with ISO 400 film proper exposure would be 1/400 @ f:16

The average reflectance of earth is 18%. So the extrapolate a proper lunar exposure (since the days are always sunny on the moon) would be one stop more exposure since the moon reflects one stop less light than earth.

So, proper lunar exposure should be 1/ISO @ f:11 regardless of the moon's phase.

Typically, people assume that because it is night they need to give the moon lots of exposure. They don't, the moon is very bright.

Unless it's getting close to bath time.

So on our recent vacation in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan I also attempted some moon shots. Returning to camp late on wednesday the sky was clear and the moon just risen over the lake we were camping by (The Blind sucker Flooding). I tried to snap pics of the moon over the lake, but the moon was always over exposed.
http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...n/IMG_5311.jpg

I noticed that on even the shorter exposures a star is also visible.
http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...n/IMG_5312.jpg

So I swung the camera around and pointed it up at Cassiopeia which hung large above the camp and used the longest exposure time of 15 seconds.

http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...n/IMG_5322.jpg

I've never got star pics before, but up there there are no real cities, and hundreds of miles of Great Lake, so the sky is very clear.

I noticed in that picture that you can also see the tree, so I s wung the camera a round to the weir that forms the Flooding.

This is the unadulterated pic.

http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...n/IMG_5323.jpg

Pretty neat I felt for just moonlight.

With a little post enhancement of brightness and contrast you get this.

http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...G_5323enh1.jpg

I'm surprised to see color, you can still see the stars too.

This is the weir from much the same spot in the morning.

http://i221.photobucket.com/albums/d...n/IMG_5330.jpg

Cool that you can see streaks from the stars' movements even with only 15 seconds. The earth spins fast.

I was discussing that with one of my cow orkers, we don't think that's what is happening, just vibration, it's not a super rock steady tripod.

Same here with the slightly wobbly tripod, just pressing the button on the camera wiggles it a bit. I found that holding the button down and taking several pics in quick succession gives me good/crisp results on the third shot.

Using the self timer works well too, just set it for 3 or 5 seconds. My old Nikon DSLR camera had an infrared remote available, not sure if your model (Sony?) has that.

My tripod isn't the sturdiest either. When I'm shooting something where I need the camera to be absolutely still, I set a two second timer which gives the camera and tripod a chance to steady itself after I have pressed the shutter lease.

When I noticed my new Christmas camera had a two second timer, I thought why in the hell would I ever want a two second timer?

I use it all the time.

A few of my favorite photos I took last weekend at a friend's 50th birthday party. Yeah, she has a small farm.

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...aryshorses.jpg



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x5/dmg1969/Horse.jpg



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x5/dmg1969/Bahhh.jpg



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...milinggoat.jpg

Is this horse named Eileen? Or is there liquor involved?

Beest, that looks beautiful. Makes me miss the likes of Mirror Lake, CO.

It's not level. Look at the trees and the building in the background.

Every time I saw that horse, it had the gangsta lean going. I know the corral wasn't quite level, but I think it might issues.....

Maybe it's the penned up horse equivalent of the 'prison pose'?

These little guys were rooting around my patio (during my stay at the Polynesian in Disney World), so I came out to get a better look and they were tame enough to eat out of my hand. However, when I tried to touch them or pick them up, Mama would fly at me - actually hit me in the chest. The pics were taken with my cell phone.

Ducks. Nuts. <---See what I did there?

Nothing overly neat about this pic except that I thought the pano stitch job came out pretty well, and lent itself to being cropped down to a standard appearance. The entrance to the Kansas City Renaissance Festival site in Bonner Springs, Kansas. Selene and I went today, and I shot this as we were leaving.

Last night was my first attempt at some celestial (other than moon) photography. I shot them at 800 ISO with a 15 second exposure (max for the camera). I believe the aperture was 2.8 on all.


The Big Dipper (Ursa Major)


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2336.jpg


The rest are not any particular constellations...just look for interesting areas or shots.


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2360.jpg


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2350.jpg


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2353.jpg


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2365.jpg

that"s pretty good. Your sensor has good noise reduction at that high ISO.

Do you have a dslr?

Glatt, no...it is not a DSLR...but I think it takes really nice photos. It's a Canon PowerShot SX20 IS. It's my first real camera as I am just starting out in this hobby.

I would like to have a more advanced camera to get more of the Milky Way. I have some of it in the background (photo 2...what appears to be smoke rising from the trees). I could try shooting at 1600 ISO (max for the camera), but it increases the noise. I might have to play around with the noise filtering on it when I try next time.

There is also something called stacking that I may experiment with. I have to do some research on it, but I gather that it is about taking multiple photos of the same area in succession (tripod a must) and combining them using software. I have a LOT to learn.

HLJ mentioned SF. - I've just been scanning in a few old (1987) transparencies

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l1...an_232_web.jpg

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l1...an_227_web.jpg

It looks just the same, except there might be a few more homeless people these days.

I did some more playing around with astrophotography last night. The skies didn't clear until around 10:30, but I was able to get a good number of images.

This first image is just a single image in a series of 14 I took in succession.



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...9/IMG_2394.jpg



This one is one I generated using DSS (Deep Sky Stacker) software by stacking all 14 images together.



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...secBiasjpg.jpg

That's a nice shot. I wish I can see that many stars where I am.

Tony and I walked the 5 mile loop around Valley Forge Park today. The deer have no fear in this park. I took this with my cell phone.

Have you ever noticed when your out and happen to see deer everything seems right with the world?

Maybe that isn't quite what I want to convey,because I am sure deer hunters would say the same thing.

Everything seems right except that you're at mile 4.5 out of 5, having beaten two major hills, and your feet are killing you and etc.

That's a feature of the park, the deer overwhelm it now and you can't fail to see them. At dusk they are especially active. At least you get a sense of what Washington's army ate in the winter.

Thanks Tulip. It helps being in a more suburban/rural setting with no light poles on our street to cast ambient light. Light pollution kills night photography.

I sometimes have a different feeling when they're running out in front of my motorcycle.

My god, enough potato chips to make up for that, will cost you a fortune.:eek:

Yeah, I suppose after five miles the magic is a little absent and dinner is looking good.

yikes! Not so benign then. be careful would ya

:D

Fixed it.

.

DINNER!

DISCOVERY !

nice light and color impact

Nice!

Thanks. They were finding these...

http://is7.itookthisonmyphone.com/m/..._568x426r0.jpg

dog poop?

:lol:

Uh...yeah....Jinx, what is it??

Freshwater snails.
link

Are those periwinkles?

You mean Grant?