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by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

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andygolfer
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by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by andygolfer » Tue Oct 07, 2014 8:35 pm

I took the dog for a walk this evening and realised how bright the moon was so after taking the dog home I grabbed by camera and tripod and walked up to the airstrip just outside my home village to see what I could achieve in the way of photos using just the moonlight. a bit of trial and error and didnt totally achieve what I wanted but this was about the best of them - what do you think?

2 questions about things I couldnt get right, can anybody advise please? -

firstly I couldnt get an image of the moon without it being a white ball unless I darkened everything right down then the aircraft disappeared which defeated the object of the exercise - would a graduated filter solve it or is there another trick I don't know about?

secondly I got those multicoloured (mainly green) reflections in all but the darkest pics (again too dark to use), is there any way of avoiding them?

any advice warmly welcomed, MTIA

Image8808 cherokee arrow g-bbzr by moonlight by sickbag_andy, on Flickr
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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by PorkScratching » Tue Oct 07, 2014 9:26 pm

Great idea and well executed! I've photographed the moon on its own and had to stop down surprisingly far to avoid over-exposing it, so I can imagine it would make the a/c silhouettes when you tried it.

Yes a graduated neutral density filter would work, but you'd have to experiment with various densities to get the effect you're looking for, which could get expensive! Although you should be able to find some pointers online to get you started.

The green reflections (lens flare) are hard to get rid of. They are caused by a small bright light source reflecting off and/or within the lenses within the lens, if you see what I mean. They have various coatings to help prevent this, but it can never be removed completely. An ND Grad filter will help though because you'll be dimming the offending light source (the moon) with one.

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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by andygolfer » Tue Oct 07, 2014 9:46 pm

Thanks for the reply Nick.

I've got a grey grad filter, I've got 2 in fact for different size lenses but they dont state the ND value, both appear to be the same max darkness. I've just held one up to the white of my screen alongside my various solid ND filters and they look to be about a max of 4ND but possible slightly less , a bit more than ND2 though. If it's a clear night tomorrow i'll have another go, I dashed off in a hurry tonight without my accessories bag so couldnt have tried it tonight even if I had thought of it at the time :(

i tried setting up the camera so that the moon was off centre to try to avoid the flare but couldnt do it, maybe the grad filter will help.
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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by PorkScratching » Wed Oct 08, 2014 11:47 am

Sounds like you have some ND filters to play with next time then!

The only shot I have with a moon in is from one of the Northolt Nightshoots. The exposure seems reasonable for getting some detail on the moon's surface, but it was behind a layer of thin cloud so is fuzzy. However, that gives me an idea - how about taking a torch next time to illuminate the a/c with? That way you can use a shorter exposure and that may bring it down to a level where the moon isn't overexposed. This is assuming you're using a tripod and long exposures rather than just ramping up the ISO so you can hand-hold - obviously with a tripod and long exposure you have a chance to wave the torch around to illuminate the a/c.

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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by andygolfer » Wed Oct 08, 2014 12:00 pm

hi Nick, I was using a tripod and experimenting with time exposures up to 30 seconds and kept the ISO on 400. I also tried some with flash (both camera's own and external) but that didnt really work and it just looked like an underexposed photo with a blurred moon! I suppose I could try setting off the external flash manually while hand holding it to one side at a longish distance from the aircraft (e.g. from my nine o'clock position). I wanted minimal light on the aircraft really and not spoiling the night sky effect.

Will try the grad filter tonight if it's clear (has been raining here all morning) will also try to get there earlier so the moon is lower in the sky to see what that does for it.
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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by PorkScratching » Wed Oct 08, 2014 7:52 pm

Good luck with the experimentation! It'll be interesting to see the results.

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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by andygolfer » Wed Oct 08, 2014 8:14 pm

PorkScratching wrote:Good luck with the experimentation! It'll be interesting to see the results.

abandoned this eveing due to the weather, watch this space.....
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Re: by the light of the silvery moon... PA.28-R, G-BBZR

Post by The Cameraman » Thu Oct 09, 2014 7:53 am

andygolfer wrote:hi Nick, I was using a tripod and experimenting with time exposures up to 30 seconds and kept the ISO on 400. I also tried some with flash (both camera's own and external) but that didnt really work and it just looked like an underexposed photo with a blurred moon! I suppose I could try setting off the external flash manually while hand holding it to one side at a longish distance from the aircraft (e.g. from my nine o'clock position). I wanted minimal light on the aircraft really and not spoiling the night sky effect.

Will try the grad filter tonight if it's clear (has been raining here all morning) will also try to get there earlier so the moon is lower in the sky to see what that does for it.
Hi Andy,

you can get some great shots by using off camera flash and on a long exposure time you should be able to get quite a few bangs of the flashgun.

You could also try painting with light, by using a wide beam torch, I find an LED work lamp works well for this.

Looking forward to your results.

Regards

Reggie

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