Full Sequence "Blood Moon" Eclipse April 2014

David_S85

Note: See updated image later in this thread

Just minutes before the eclipse began, the sky was 100% clouded up and snow was falling, as it had been all day. At 12:05am local time, two minutes before the first shot, the clouds fully dispersed and the seeing remained at 100% until literally one minute after the last shot was taken when it reverted back to a cloudy sky. The Chicago area is known for its lousy skies. After missing 90% of all eclipses, meteor showers and most other astronomical displays over the decades, I feel very lucky to have seen this at all.

Composite of many photos from the April 15, 2014 total lunar eclipse, aka the "Blood Moon." The sequence begins at the upper right and finishes at lower left. The nine individual moon frames were chosen from the best of 70 shots from the full duration of four hours and forty minutes. The Moon's color was different at the end due to atmospheric differences compared to when it was overhead. Some individual frames have had their exposures altered in post to seem more natural. The middle shot is when the Moon was fully in the Earth's shadow. The red hue seen is a reflection off the Moon due to the filtered reddish color of all the Earth's sunsets added up and mixed into the Earth's shadow cast on the Moon.

The reason the final sequence appears to be laid out backwards, right to left, is due to the actual path of the moon takes through the Earth's umbra (shadow) during the eclipse. Earth's rotation only makes it appear to move from left to right as we're viewing it in the sky. There is a PDF here that explains this in more detail. The other reason I composited it this way is that the shadows would all face into the middle "blood moon" instead of facing outwards. For art's sake, as it were.

Technical details:
Most shots were handheld at 1/1600, F/8, ISO 800, and manual exposure. The middle "Blood Moon" shot at 0.8 sec, f/9, ISO 800 and on a tripod. All shots with "Daylight" white balance. Canon 5D3 and Canon 400mm 5.6 L lens.

Stumblebum

Wow! Just wow! clap:ivar

moose135

Terrific sequence, David!

David_S85

Thanks, guys! It was well worth the 28 degrees and staying up until ~5am for this. I stayed inside, mostly, watching a couple of movies while nature did its thing -- walked outside every 15 minutes or so. Good thing Tuesday was one of my days off.

Editing this was oh-so-fun - not!

ChrisJ

Fabulous sequence! I didn't even stay awake to see totality, so I'm glad others like you did. Nice job!

Juano

Great sequence and that KS for sharing the technical info.

Eia

WoW

anonymouscuban

Very cool David. I considered shooting the moon but since my longest lens is 200mm on my FF bodies, I instead decided to lay in bed and sulk like a little kid that got no presents on his birthday.

Great job. Very jelly right now.

pathfinder

Very nice sequence, David. I am jealous!

bgarland

Nice work David. I wimped out and went to bed just before it got to full eclipse. I used the same lens and threw a 1.4 teleconverter on it.

black mamba

Boy, David, that's a wall hanger for sure. When they come out this good, it makes all the effort put forth in getting the shot worth it. Outstanding work.

Take care,

Tom

kdog

Excellent, David!

David_S85

Chris, Cristobal, Anna, Alex, Jim, Brad, Tom, Joel,

Thanks, all, for the kind words.

rwells

Excellent effort and result David

jwear

The shots and set up are great but for one thing the eclipse was from left to right not from right to left in these shots ?? these shots the moon was covered from right too left how is that so?

David_S85

jwear wrote: »

The shots and set up are great but for one thing the eclipse was from left to right not from right to left in these shots ?? these shots the moon was covered from right too left how is that so?

The shadows would look weird the other way (L to R). Map it out in reverse and you'll see that the shadows would all point away from the middle shot. Since the "blood moon" frame was the key and the darkest of the series, I made the decision to arrange it this way -- the first at the top and continuing downward. Here is a NASA eclipse guide I used to plan the series and the shoot, and also depicts how the Earth's umbra passes over the moon with respect to time. The composite shot above follows that timing sequence.

Another (very nice) photo at Spaceweather shows this in a similar way. And another (huge) series.

In the end I sided towards an artistic and balanced composite.

jwear

OK the reason for my ? I was ask to shot it and with the very little research I had time for did no get the red was after the cover. I was so tired at 12:30 I put up my gear. It took me sometime to get the long shot idea ,I do wildlife so the faster the better not the slower,BIG learning curve. I thought you would see it on the east coast close to what I saw on the west but not sure how far off the curve would be. As ART this works ! Mine from light to dark ,black and white I would have to have a red paint brush but in Oct I think it is, I will give it a better try (at least now I have a camera setting to start with)
As you can see by views and comments your way was the right way and thanks Jeff

David_S85

Jeff, that red exposure was something like 9 to 10 stops apart from a 3/4 moon. And noisy as heck, even with the 5D3, due to its dimness. I messed that one up, and a few others like it, with f/9. Should have been 5.6. Due to that it ended up at 0.8 seconds - far too slow for a moon which moves its entire diameter every 2m35s. Live view at 10x for manual focusing is the way to go with stuff like this, and bracketing like mad. But staying up until 5am and in 28 degrees was the real bitch, even for a night owl like me. Since this was from my back yard and the side street (stupid trees) I was luckily able to often duck inside to continue watching TV and confuse the cats with my late night adventures.

The strangest part was that to the eye, it was easily visible in all portions including full dark red. While a camera can easily be boosted by ISO or exposure time to see it, it just reminds us of how good the eyes and brain are to see things like this. We don't have cameras to capture a 20-stop range yet.

Is the October eclipse a full eclipse for North America? I haven't looked that up yet.

Eia

David_S85 wrote: »

Jeff, that red exposure was something like 9 to 10 stops apart from a 3/4 moon. And noisy as heck, even with the 5D3, due to its dimness. I messed that one up, and a few others like it, with f/9. Should have been 5.6. Due to that it ended up at 0.8 seconds - far too slow for a moon which moves its entire diameter every 2m35s. Live view at 10x for manual focusing is the way to go with stuff like this, and bracketing like mad. But staying up until 5am and in 28 degrees was the real bitch, even for a night owl like me. Since this was from my back yard and the side street (stupid trees) I was luckily able to often duck inside to continue watching TV and confuse the cats with my late night adventures.

The strangest part was that to the eye, it was easily visible in all portions including full dark red. While a camera can easily be boosted by ISO or exposure time to see it, it just reminds us of how good the eyes and brain are to see things like this. We don't have cameras to capture a 20-stop range yet.

Is the October eclipse a full eclipse for North America? I haven't looked that up yet.

Wow....informative!

jwear

David
I have NEVER shot at night (not true I forgot one time before] and I also was in the back yard shooting in between 2 big palm trees as the moon moved left to right. At a fast speed when you are trying to set and shoot [not a red tail hawk] but at midnight and 69 years of age I was yelling ,just pose dam u . I was shooting a 600 mm and a d3s then after shooting at iso 200 f18 and 1/125 manual , auto focus and manual both,I saw the moon in camera put on the tc2 and re set re set etc.
I will be shooting at about the same view you had this time next time oct . You will be off to the right a lot. I was almost at the center on a clear night but too dumb to know all I should have. In the last 3 shots before the moon was gone if you blow them up 100% on computer you can see the red.Oct 8 is the next one I think . Jeff

moose135

David_S85 wrote: »

Is the October eclipse a full eclipse for North America? I haven't looked that up yet.

It is a full eclipse, but it sounds like the end of it will be after moonset in many areas. Here are the details for Chicago - looks like it will be an early morning for you, David.

http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/usa/chicago?iso=20141008

The September 2015 looks much better for the eastern half of the US.

http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/lunar/2015-september-28

David_S85

jwear wrote:

David
I have NEVER shot at night (not true I forgot one time before] and I also was in the back yard shooting in between 2 big palm trees as the moon moved left to right.

ISO 200 might be too slow unless you are on a tripod and fully open with the best glass. The moon moves FAST! Since noise is almost a non-issue these days, anything between ISO 400 and 1600 is plenty of fair room. I would normally have shot all these with a tripod, except the cold was an issue. I therefore bumped it up to 800 and shot the 400mm handheld so I could rush back inside. Also due to the cold, I shot autofocus to speed up the outside / return to inside. Besides, the cold would have warped the manual focusing out of whack every few minutes, even if I had taped the lens. I thought I had a better chance with auto (and proper focus point selections) and then shooting at least three discrete shots without continuous drive. I would have gladly spent more time outside if it had been far warmer though. I mean, just to actually see something like this in Chicago was as special as the eclipse itself since it is almost always overcast.

What I would normally have done or had wanted to do:
Tripod (with weight hanging below it), full manual exposure, manual white balance to daylight*, no TC** (the results in the past weren't noticeably better), ISO around 320-400, more fully open than not, shutter speeds of 1/500 or better at 400mm (faster for 600mm), mirror lockup, silent shutter to reduce shutter slap-back vibration even more, and electronic cable release (or 2 sec. timer). Play with the manual exposures (or practice on a 3/4 full moon beforehand) until you are pleased with the settings and results and write them down! Manually focus with live view and magnification of 10x and then recheck that every few shots if temps are strange to regain proper focus. Set LCD view to a lower brightness because your eyes will adjust to the darkness. Histograms are absolutely no help with shots like this due to the contrast between the darkness of sky vs. the brightness of the moon. Wear a headlamp with a red LED or set to very low lumens so you can check camera settings in the dark. You will be repointing the rig every minute due to the speed of the Earth turning, so an easy to set ball head position is a must. Oh yes, have a spare battery too.

* The moon is lit by the sun - the same as a fully lit unshaded terrestrial situation - and with similar brightness. Remember you aren't shooting a true night scene.

** If I had a 200mm lens or less, then a high quality TC to match the lens might be a good idea. Kenko or Tamron TC on a Nikon or Canon lens - don't.

Here's a great video I forgot to link earlier:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f5MUyF_Q78#t=152

Fiddlestix

Congratulations on a beautiful sequence of images and compositing. This obviously took a lot of effort and time to complete. One minor suggestion if I could? The moon will travel in a path the is a gentle arc while your composite appears to be a very straight line path. If you were to position the composite images in a downward arc it would, i feel, add more realism to the composite.

Sam

Incredible! Your planing, dedication and gamble (that the skies would clear) paid off big time.

I would absolutely print this puppy and hang it on the wall.

Sam

Richard

David_S85 wrote: »

In the end I sided towards an artistic and balanced composite.

Good choice. The results are stunning.

Earache

Richard wrote: »

Good choice. The results are stunning.

with Richard and all the others!!

boco

Prachtig.
grt,boco.

JC

Nicely done, one question though, why would the cold have been changing the manual focus position so quickly? Where you were, wouldn't it just have been consistently cold over the course of the eclipse?

David_S85

JC wrote: »

Nicely done, one question though, why would the cold have been changing the manual focus position so quickly? Where you were, wouldn't it just have been consistently cold over the course of the eclipse?

Thanks! The longer the focal length and the wider the aperture, the exact focus range is quite razor thin. If I had conditioned the gear down from from the 70 degrees F inside to the 28 it was outside, then it would probably not change much. I was running outside, shooting a half dozen shots, then running back in. I didn't want the all that gear out in the dark mostly unattended for five hours, even if it was my own back yard. I live a few houses away from large high school, so…

JC

Ahh, I was sleeping next to my tripod with a timer going off every 10 minutes to remind me to take a shot after an exposure adjustment, but that apparently didn't stop me from knocking the focus ring on the lens at the quarter mark (same lens as you, btw) and couldn't get the focus back at that point, so missed the totality with a fuzzy moon. Shot some star trails with an included moon trail over the next couple of nights, decided to try that for the next eclipse, since it's fairly failsafe for me.

( for some reason the quote button isn't working for me)

David_S85

There's some browser / Dgrin compatibility problem we haven't figured out yet on quotes and new thread title's being buggered up. Sorry. You can always copy/paste a quote manually and wrap [ quote = username ] around the quote and finish with [ / quote ] <-- I added extra spaces in there to deactivate the example.

I practiced with a few different focus expansion settings in the 5D3 beforehand so I could reliably shoot in autofocus while the moon was still bright enough. It seemed to be reliable enough in review to not require the tripod until totality happened. I settled on the center point plus an extra four on each side, which covered the moon diameter perfectly. In retrospect, I should probably have used nine center points grouped. Either probably would work. The center blood moon, due to its dimness, was manual exposure - and that was so dang dark I had a hard time even with live view to get that one. It was focus and pray, mostly.

I shot from three to six of each phase. I settled on nine select frames for the composite to keep it simple in presentation, but I have something like 18 phases I could have used.