Crescent Moonsetby `shagie

Photography / Animals, Plants & Nature / Weather and Sky

Shot in Yosemite. As anyone who has browsed my gallery [link] can tell, the setting crescent moon is one of my favorite subjects. This last trip was no exception.

Wensday I got into Mariposa and went to find some place to eat. Walking back, I saw the thin crescent moon setting in the Sierras and decided that the next night I would shoot the photo somewhere in Yosemite. That I did. This is shooting a bit to the left of Yosemite Falls from the valley floor.

This was shot at 400mm on a Nikon N80 using Velvia film. The lens was at f/5.6, aperture priority. Each shot was a set of 3, bracketed by 1.5 stops on each side. I found I tend to prefer the under exposed one for more detail in the moon

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~ncr7 Jun 20, 2007

nice picture... How long of an exposure is it? I am hoping to get a bunch of Moon pictures whenever I can get the moon in the right place in the sky along with the clouds.

`shagie Jul 1, 2007

A fairly short exposure when you get down to it. The thing to remember is that the visible part moon itself is an object in the full sun. Thus, an exposure for almost daylight conditions is a better choice.

If possible, use a spot meter and meter the moon itself and work the exposure from there. Modern matrix meters try to do too much work for you and make the sky too bright - and thus over expose the moon.

~ncr7 Jul 3, 2007

Ok cool, I'll try that tonight if there are no clouds. I tried again last night and the moon keeps getting over exposed like you said. I just get a big white blur. Thanks for the info