This week saw a total Lunar Eclipse that was visible in many parts of North and South America and parts of eastern Asia. A Lunar Eclipse occurs when the Earth passes between the Sun and the Moon and the moon falls into the Earths shadow cone. When the Moon is fully in shadow, sunlight is refracted through earths shadow, the shorter wavelength blue light is filtered out and the longer wavelength red light passes through illuminating the Moon with faint reddish light. Global weather conditions will dictate on how bright the Moon appears.

The Global Pictures Desk saw contributions from many points making for an interesting file. Some efforts were more successful than others on a difficult subject to shoot.

The two biggest issues we saw were underexposed and/or out of focus images. The exposure change from the full moon to when it is fully eclipsed is about 12 stops.

Mario Anzuoni

Doug Murray

This low light level and the rotation of the earth puts a limit on how long your exposure can be before you start to get movement in image. From our experience about one second is the maximum. Shorter exposures will produce a much deeper red color but the Moon is too dark and too much noise becomes apparent when the image is toned.

Focusing on the fully eclipsed moon is very difficult. It is best not to rely on AF and manually pre-focus your lens when the Moon is still full and use that setting for when it is eclipsed.

Weather conditions where you are will also dictate what kind of pictures, if any, you can make. Obviously clear skies are best. Heavy cloud made for less than satisfying results.

Daniel Munoz

There has been quite a bit of discussion online about what color the moon is when it is in eclipse. Some viewers say that many pictures are too red and exaggerate the effect. The simplest way to ensure accurate color for these kinds of celestial events is to shoot with the cameras color balance set to Daylight.

Beyond the standard straight images we also received nice combos from Henry Romero and Richard Clement. These take some planning and are often used for educational purposes.

Henry Romero

Richard Clement
We didnt see any multiple image photos of the moon crossing the night sky as it went through the phases. Perhaps next time.