Moon shots, where did I go wrong?

[attack_donut]

Greetings gang-

Last night, in my neighborhood, I had the perfect opportunity to shoot a totally clear sky, with cresent moon, stars, and various blinking bits.

I was using 400 speed film, with an f-stop of 22, on a 50mm lens and an exposure time of 30s, as well as a tripod and remote shutter release.

Nothing came out when developed. Nothing.

Where did I go wrong? Is there a chart somewhere that can point me to exposure times when shooting night skies?

Cheers!

[ermintrude]

Did you dev it yourself? Can you see the frame numbers on the edge of the film?

Although its dark the moon is obviously very bright so you shouldnt have a problem getting it to record, although thats a very, very small aperture, why did you choose that? .

You didnt do anything forgetful like leave the lens cap on (we've all done it! ) or you've deved the wrong film by accident? Was the film winding on correctly?

Could it be with the remote shutter release?

I missed the meteor shower, I fell asleep

[Malcolm_Stewart]

Greetings gang-

Last night, in my neighborhood, I had the perfect opportunity to shoot a totally clear sky, with cresent moon, stars, and various blinking bits. ...

... Where did I go wrong? Is there a chart somewhere that can point me to exposure times when shooting night skies?

Cheers!

The following moon picture should give you some idea of what exposure worked on my 10D. The Canon extender correctly reports the change in f stop whereas the Tamron doesn't, so the aperture reported from my 10D should read "f8". As the illuminated crescent area gets smaller, you need more exposure, but I can't remember how much.

[frank1]

You won't get much with a 50mm lens and at 30 secs exposure all you'll see is streaks of light. You must remember to counteract the movement of the earth , bit of bugger that one but its what makes the world go round. Unless you were trying to capture movement and there are some fantastic shots to be had. Generally a wide apeture and a fast shutter speed and perhaps a longer lens oh a sturdy tripod also. Its not easy to get right and you'd be amazed of fast the earth moves. Good luck for next time.

[Malcolm_Stewart]

In "Night Sky Photography" pub. 1988, the author H. J. P. Arnold suggests the following:
for trail free shots, divide 500 by the focal length of your lens to get the maximum shutter speed in seconds. So a 50mm lens should be OK for up to 10s.

He also suggests the following for the moon (using ISO 400):
Crescent 1/60 f11
Quarter 1/250 f8
Gibbous 1/250 f11
Full 1/250 f16
and lots of bracketing if you're using film.

(All I know is that putting my cameras onto my Meade ETX105 telescope, I can track stars etc. easily but I quickly run into the effects of cogging in the alt/az gear train, and light pollution around here is a serious issue for longer exposures.)
HTH

[GlenF]

I have take a few shots of the moon and used around a 1/60 shutter as anything more than a coule of seconds burnt out. I used a 300mm lens with a 2x teleconverter and there were stars in the viewfinder but they didn't come out. I have the pic I took on mtspace linked below.

http://viewmorepics.myspace.com/index.cf...imageID=3150550

[attack_donut]

No I didn't develop myself, and I didn't leav the lens cap on, but thanks for the tips.

I was using the f22 (and mind you, I'm a compete newbie) in an attempt to make the stars twinkle and get the max. clarity.

I see now I need to open up a bit and try it again.

Fortunately film is cheap!

Thanks

[ermintrude]

No I didn't develop myself, and I didn't leav the lens cap on, but thanks for the tips.

I wasnt being sarcastic, you should have still seen something with a 30 second exposure. Which is why I asked if you could see the frame numbers on the edge of the film, so you knew if it had been developed correctly.

[attack_donut]

I didn't mean to come off wrong, it's hard to judge emotions on text writings.

The pics were developed, but they were all black, nonetheless, the skies are clear, and the moon is still with us, so I'll try again.

[Woolliscroft]

It might be something as simple as the film not loading properly. I long ago developed the habit of keeping my left thumb on the rewind knob on my SLRs to feel whether or not the film is actually flowing, but with my rangefinders and my one motorised SLR I have to keep a close eye on the indicators to make sure all is well. I doubt if there is one of us who hasn't shot a blank roll at one time or another because we forgot to check and with the rangefinders I am usually worrying too much about whether I remembered the lens cap.

[Ellie527]

There's a chart and other information on Andrzej Wrotniak's site.
http://www.wrotniak.net/photo/moon/index.html

[Fozzybear]

Not intending to do any kind of pro-digi anti-film, this is just a recounting of my experiences so please don't anyone think I'm film-bashing (I like using film still):

I had terrible results when I tried shooting the moon using film years ago. I tried using the guides on exposure settings and techniques but didn't managed to get anything more than a white blurry disc. It was only when I got a digital slr that I managed to get my technique down and start making usable images - the immediate viewing of the image made experimenting with different exposures much easier. The images I get with a 300mm have the moon pretty small in the frame but you can still get a surprising amount of detail. I shot this handheld trying out my new Nikkor 70-300VR the other day:


http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulforsdick/511286697/

That was shot at ISO 200, 1/200s f/6.3

[attack_donut]

Thank you for the heads up, I will do some trying with my newly purchased dSLR as well as my film (from what I have learned from here) and post some results.

[beejaybee]

I was using the f22 (and mind you, I'm a compete newbie) in an attempt to make the stars twinkle and get the max. clarity.

I see now I need to open up a bit and try it again.

For stars, with a 50mm lens, try 15 sec at full aperture on the fastest speed film you can get. Generally best when there's no moon around. If you want to see star trails, try much longer exposures. Film speed doesn't matter as reciprocity failure takes over, in fact slow film may record more than fast film at very long exposures. Point directly at the Pole Star. With a good dark sky I find 2 hours at f/5.6 on 100 ASA is good. Use a lens hood and beware of the lens dewing over.

For the Moon, use a long lens (at least 500mm). Bracket exposures around 1/250 at f/8 on 400 ASA (less if the Moon is full or nearly so, more if it's a thin crescent or low in a hazy sky). If you see earthshine on a thin crescent Moon ("the old moon in the young moon's arms") you may be able to capture it with exposures around 1 sec at f/8 on 400 ASA, but there will be heavy glare from the sunlit portion of the crescent. Don't go over 1 sec on a 500 mm lens unless you have a driven mount.

[andycknight]

When I started out Shooting the Night Sky, I used a 50mm prime lens set to f2, with 400ASA film on a tripod. (I have always found faster film too grainy) Exposure was between 10 and 20 seconds if looking South or maybe 30 if looking North. (It all depends on how much motion blur you can accept)

If you don't have a tripod place the camera on a beanbag or pillow, lock open the shutter and use the lens cap to do the exposure so you don't rock the camera.

If you point it at the pole star you can get away with 60 seconds before trailing starts to show. But hey what's wrong with a star trail shot of the pole anyway (Try f5.6 for say 5 mins)

When you get the Photo's devoloped tell them to print regardless - even if it looks blank - The dots(stars) are there!

One last point, if you live in the city, you will find that exposures longer than 1 min will give a bright pink or orange sky! So it's worth taking the trouble to head away from the city lights!

Hope this helps.

[AJUK]

When you say nothing came out, do you mean under or over exposed?

[Towershot]

We all do and say silly things now and then,I left my lenscap on the other dayfor three shots and thought em a little dark [img]/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]. And the other month told Erm to focus on the eyes in a self portraite,DOH!! thick or what .

[Woolliscroft]

By the way, f22 won't give you maximum clarity. You will be well into defraction by then, whilst the long shutter speed will also allow the Earth's rotation to blur things. If you want maximum lens quality out of most 50mm lenses, try f8.

[mike_j]

This was taken with a 1200mm mirror lens (telescope) 1/20th f13



The biggest enemy is vibration, I find that as my camera doesn't have mirror lock up directly I have to use the 2 second delay self timer.

[beejaybee]

The biggest enemy is vibration

I find that unsteady air is more of a problem when using very long focal lengths.