The Errant Æsthete

While you were trying to choose between a petite clutch with jewel adornments or suede accents for a festive evening accoutrement, Mother Earth was accessorizing with far more breathtakingly brilliant results. The following are what the truly fashion conscious will be coveting this season. Admit it! When it comes to getting ready for a night out on the town, the moon and a martini are all anyone really needs.

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, as you all should know, occurs when the Earth passes between the Sun and the Moon and the Moon falls into the Earth’s shadow cone. When the Moon is fully in shadow, sunlight is refracted through earth’s 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.

Doug Murray

The Global Pictures Desk (Reuters) 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

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 camera’s color balance set to Daylight.

Reuters Photographers