Full Moon with 300mm

Just got the film back and I'm surprised how SMALL the moon looks.

 

I took several shots of the full moon with my 300mm. Different exposures.

 

Some of the exposures look OK, but it's SO SMALL. Less than a

centimeter on my 4x5 print.

 

Focus looks pretty good, but to enlarge it to any decent size at all

seems like it would be blurry and grainy.

 

What size lens do you need to get a decent size print??

 

-Frustrated....

I believe you need about 2000mm on full frame, 1250mm on a 1.6 digital body.

 

Your best bet might be to rent a 600mm lens and a teleconverter or two. Good luck!

Oops, forgot this...<div></div>

Your shutter speed is important for moon shots. The moon is moving. You need at least 1/30th of a sec to stop the movement. I use at least a 400mm lens when doing moon shots with a 35mm film camera. If other things are in the picture, you cannot make the moon look too big. If it is the moon itself, use a 500mm with a tc. Make sure your film or ISO is fast enough to stop movement. Joe Smith

I believe the formula is that 100mm of lens focal length equals 1mm of width on a film camera

I agree with Sheldon -- full frame of the moon requires a lot of focal length. This is what I

got with 1000 mm on a 1.3X camera:<P>

 

<CENTER>

<img src ="http://www.biology.ucr.edu/personal/MACphotos/easternSierra/

moonrise2.jpg">

</center>

This was shot near sunrise, which makes the moon appear larger but also results in some atmospheric distortion. Tamron 70-300mm lens at 300mm. Sorry, lost the exposure data...

Hi Bob, This is a reply to your email. Hope it's okay to paste onto this forum post (save for posterity :)

 

This is with a 600 mm, right?

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/3541895&size=lg

 

I've got a 300mm, and the moon is less than a centimeter wide on my 4 x 6 prints.... ???

 

How big was the moon in your original print? Simple math tells me that with twice as big a lens, it would be twice as big. IE: Less than two centimeters... So you enlarged it THAT much and it's still that clear and sharp??? I can't believe this... Any suggestions?

 

Yes, the photo was taken on the Fuji S2 in 12MP jpeg mode with my old 600mm f/5.6 I believe I did print a few shots, but they would have been heavily cropped... as this image is. Keep in mind that the 600mm is an extremely sharp lens. I manually focused and refocused several times to acquire as close to perfect focus as possible. I used manual exposure, bracketed, and a cable release.

 

I'll find the orig and post what the entire uncropped image sometime soon, for sake of reference. Last summer I tried my 500mm + TC, but I think I just used AF... results weren't as sharp as from the old 600mm. Next time I will try manual focus.

 

Cheers, -Greg-

The rule of thumb from the slide rule era is what larry mentioned, usable for the sun or moon. You divide teh focal lenght by 100, to get the image size on the film or sensor. This is good enough for ballpark estimates. Thus your 300mm lens makes a 3mm image on the sensor or film. If enlarged by say 4.3X for a 4x6 print; you get about a 13mm image; say 1/2 inch on the print.

The moon's distance varies abit during its orbit; so you can get a slightly larger images by planning with an astronomical calendar. The actual focal length of you lens is not true also; it maybe several percent high or low from the nameplate. I once worked in a small observatory that had a Clarke 8" lens with a 96" focal length. The image of the moon was about equal to the 24mm width on a Nikon F2's filmframe; and sometimes on too big.

For Joseph Smith:

 

You said:

 

"You need at least 1/30th of a sec to stop the movement."

 

For moon shots the f/11 rule applies. (almost the earthly f/16 rule). How would you get 1/30 of a second of exposure? At low 100 ISO, you would use 1/125 sec and f/11, and equivalently 1/30 sec and f/22.

 

Why would you want your lens to be diffraction limited? Why f/22? For added depth of field? With 1/30 sec and a long lens, you would need the sturdiest of tripods not to blur the picture. I personally would prefer 1/250 sec and f/8.

Yes, sunny 16's and lunar 'levens.........

I have been quite happy with 1000mm on full frame 35mm film. I normally shoot the moon with Pan F 50 ASA which will allow a nice 4-6" diameter image in a print with very little detail loss.

You guys have so good moon photos, especially Greg S, that I have nothing to say. I read your note Greg about shadows on non-full moon. But I never was able to record any craters. I only can wish to know the trick to try one day.

 

But here are full frames just to show what size we get with two setups. First 500mm+1.4X before sunset (wird sky) on 1.6X camera.<div></div>

Second one 500mm+1.4X+2X stocked. About 20 minute after sunset.<div></div>

Also question, as here we may have a few people attracted to this thread with knowledge in astronomy. This is a first time I ever saw this phenomena. Huge bright bow above sun before, during and after sunrise. Sky was clear. Anybody can tell me what make this happen? Photo is straight from camera.

<p style="text-align:center"><img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/4130967-lg.jpg" /></p>

I was interested to find the original, see what it looked like, and what manual settings I used.

 

Here is the original uncropped photo (same image as link above was derived from), downsized to 500 pixels across & usm'd a bit<div></div>

same photo, cropped : 600mm, 1/60 sec, f/8<div></div>

same photo, full pixel size crop : 600mm, 1/60 sec, f/8<div></div>

"Some of the exposures look OK, but it's SO SMALL. Less than a centimeter on my 4x5 print."

 

Whoops, I misread this as if he were shooting with a 4x5 LF camera. anyone want to contemplate the lens required to fill a 4"x5" frame with the moon?

"lens required to fill a 4"x5" frame with the moon?"

 

about 4000mm to fill the 4" space? (quick approximation based on my 600mm shot)

Here is an uncropped full frame 35mm print scan with a 1250mm f13.8 Meade ATX 90 catadioptric telescope.

I used a handmade mat in front of the lens operated by hand (waved) at approximately 1/10 of a second (calculated). Camera was open on B and no vibration was conducted to the camera because the "mat shutter" was never in contact with the lens. Kodacolor 200. It was hard to do because I could barely see the moon well enough through the camera at f13.8 to focus accurately.

ozarque@hotmail.com<div></div>

full crop of above shot w/ATX 90. not too sharp

No filter used, as evident, the shadow on a crescent moon will accentuate the craters.<div></div>