Moon - since all the cool kids are shooting it!

I am a novice to photography just wanted to see if I could shoot the moon using the only telephoto lens I have the Panasonic 45-175mm - not long enough to get a close up but result is not bad. Shot hand held but high shutter speed.

Straight out of camera JPG - ok this lens isn't long enough!

100% crop from paint.net no processing

Its not the sharpest but for 100% crop I have to say I am quite happy with how well my first try turned out.

I decided to make mine a blue moon tonight

I have a question on how you shot this? There is a beautiful moon out tonight, so I thought I would try some shots. Using the EM10 and 40-150mm lens, I can see the moon, and even better, using the 10X zoom to get in real close, I can see all the details on the moon. Then, I decide to take a picture - and my picture comes out as one big white/yellow spot... zooming in for cropping, I see no details of the moon.

What am I doing wrong? Is it shutter speed? Exposure? everything?

Thanks for the help.

The luminance of the moon, above the horizon on a clear night calls for a basic exposure @ ISO 100 of 1/250 Sec @ f/8. It is easiest to shoot the moon in Manual Exposure Mode, as you don't have to dial in a ton of exposure compensation for over-exposure caused by auto metering.

I would recommend keeping the shutter speed at least 1/125 or faster to freeze the movement of the moon in the frame. Simply adjust aperture to get the correct exposure. Use of a tripod and cable release is also helpful.

Here is an example shot with my E-M5 and EC-14/Sigma 50-500mm combo. I also used the DTC (Digital Teleconverter) on this shot -- so this is framed exactly as it came out of my camera.

This is a nice moon shot, but is several stops under-exposed. Your shutter speed was much faster than needed -- next time try shooting this using the same ISO and Aperture, only slow the shutter speed down to about 1/250 Sec. -- be sure to use a tripod.

Thanks for all the help. I will try these suggestions tonight and see how it goes. Hopefully will end up with something reasonable.

Wayne Lee wrote:

Thanks for all the help. I will try these suggestions tonight and see how it goes. Hopefully will end up with something reasonable.

There's an exposure rule called "loony 11" F11 and shutter = 1/ISO

So if you're shooting F11 and ISO 400, set shutter to 1/400.

If you're using a fixed mirror lens at F8 for example, it's twice as bright. Raise shutter speed to 1/800. Do note of course f8 mirror lenses are darker than normal anyway.

I'd recommend at least 300mm. Even at 500mm, it's pretty small. Manually focus and lens for accuracy. Disable display auto brightness, or zoom magnification so that you can make out moon details. Use a remote trigger (generic ones are cheap and work great).

This moon was shot with a cheap old $60 500mm F8 lens. I've applied a little sharpening.

Full moon pics will appear devoid of the nice details you make out in half moon or similar pics. The reason is simple - anything other than full moon is getting side lighting which is the kind of lighting you want to bring out details in anything. Full moon gets direct lighting.

Moon at 500mm, F11. View in full to avoid what looks like cellulite at the bottom. Thanks dpreview scaling...