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geekyrocketguy
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This is Not a Composite Image
This is Not a Composite Image

[rant]
I /really/ hate images with giant moons have been Photoshopped into the sky. It's fake. It's tasteless. It trivializes an actual challenge in photography. And most of the time it's not even done well. If the dark side of the moon is darker than the sky, you evidently don't realize that the moon is located outside Earth's atmosphere. The moon is lit by the Sun, so the lit side of the moon should be facing the Sun. A full moon will never be located *in* the sunset. And if you insist on Photoshopping the moon into places where it doesn't belong or enlarging it, at least have the decency to not lie about it. Evidently it has become enough of a problem that someone else set up a twitter feed dedicated to shaming fake moon images.
[/rant]

Now that that is out of the way, on a happier note, I've had this photo idea in mind for a long time. I wanted to shoot it last summer, but couldn't get up Mauna Kea on a night with the moon in the right position. My idea was to set up a telephoto a mile or so away from Keck and timelapse the full moon rising as the last light of sunset fades on the domes. However, calculating exactly where to stand was rather difficult--any small error would result in the moon utterly missing Keck.

Toward that end, I decided to set up four cameras. I used three cameras to film timelapse and dedicated the fourth to opportunistic still images. The total weight of the four cameras and associated telephoto lenses and tripods was 60 lbs (25 kg), which I ended up backpacking a substantial distance across the 13,000-ft-high lava fields. I spaced out the three timelapse cameras across 200 ft (60 m) in hopes that at least one camera would get the proper alignment.

Surprisingly, the moon rose exactly where I expected it to, and within a few seconds of my predicted time. The extra timelapse cameras weren't necessary. This image of the full moon transiting the Keck 1 dome was captured by my Rebel + 70-300mm at 300mm and then cropped a bit. This is processed from a single raw frame--no HDR or compositing is involved. I adjusted the shadows and highlights a bit, but the dynamic range of the Rebel is best described as "abysmal," so I couldn't process it heavily even if I wanted.

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Taken on: June 1, 2015
Tags: Everybody's photos tagged with keck keck Everybody's photos tagged with moon moon Everybody's photos tagged with moonrise moonrise more » Everybody's photos tagged with full full Everybody's photos tagged with 1 1 Everybody's photos tagged with I I Everybody's photos tagged with telescope telescope Everybody's photos tagged with mauna kea mauna kea Everybody's photos tagged with hawaii hawaii « less
Sets appears in:   • Mauna Kea    • Favorite Night Photos   
Groups appears in:   • Observatories    • We love Mauna Kea    more » • Hawaii Photographs    • Big Island, Hawaii    • *Twilight    • Hawaii Paradise    • Astronomical Observatories    « less
Camera: Canon EOS REBEL T2i, f/8.0, 1/60 sec, 300mm, ISO 200 (more info) (hide info)
Camera: Canon EOS REBEL T2i
Lens: EF70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM
Aperture: f/8.0
Exposure Time: 0.017 sec (1/60)
Focal Length: 300mm
ISO: 200
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program: Manual
Exposure Mode: Manual
Metering Mode: Multi-segment
White Balance: Auto
Color Space: sRGB
Software: Adobe Photoshop Camera Raw 9.0 (Windows)
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