Practicing moon shots
Hopes and expectations
While I was so happy to have a new camera about a week before the full moon this month, I was totally hoping to have at least one really good shot of the moon for the first time in years. I practiced capturing the moon in the evenings while I could see it from our balcony but without good results. There were definitely some improvements but I knew I had to dig into the camera settings more and learn to be able to nail it.
It was the worst week to do so because I was overloaded with other stuff and the few evenings when I could practice, it was very cloudy. This is ok for the moon shots but sometimes I was waiting for 5 minutes or longer until the moon appeared again and I don't have a new tripod yet. The old one we have is only good for phone usage and definitely not solid enough to hold this heavier camera. So it was just me and the camera.
Luckily for me, one evening, I could sit on our couch with the balcony door open, resting my arm on the armrest while waiting for the moon to appear. The picture in the header is the best shot of the moon when it wasn't full yet.
Settings
I went online to look up how to shoot the moon and copied the settings. At least, as far as I could because I got stuck there as well at some point. Later I just tried to adjust some settings and see what happens to get a feel with it, eventually leading up to the shot above so at least I have one where you can see the moon details, even though it's far from what I hoped. This was one of the first days that I had the camera, btw.
The pictures I captured the next day were extremely overexposed and I had some back issues that night as well so I called it a day and hoped for a better chance the next evening. There were still some days left until the full moon would be there and I remained hopeful.
Thunderstorms
The next evening there was no moon to be seen as the weather was really bad and we even had thunderstorms. No success in capturing these lightning shows but I had one video with some cool footage and hoping to grab some pictures from that another day. At least we had one hell of a show from our floor seeing the lightning strike above the sea. The best thing is that it was a free show!
Waking up with a moon view
When I walked into my daughter's room to open her window, I noticed the moon was just in sight next to the building in front of us. I quickly grabbed my camera but it wasn't my best night so half sleepwalking I pointed the camera into the direction of the moon.
With just minutes on the clock to bring her to school, I had to rush capturing it and sadly none of them were as clear as I hoped. Just during these few minutes, the moon was already moving towards disappearing behind the building or mountains. Here you can see the difference very well with the first picture (above) and the last one:
Disappointed
I'm disappointed that I could not find time this week to practice the camera settings more but such is life. Work was calling and we have a full calendar this weekend as well so I had to prepare some stuff. Even though the supermoon was missed this time, at least I will have a full month to get familiar with my camera and hopefully capture another full moon next month. I hope to never miss one again from now on.
There's something magical about the moon and I love taking pictures of that, especially when it looks extra special, such as a few months ago when it was shining so closely above the sea, seen from our balcony. But that will probably take another 9 months or so before it's there for me to capture.
Oh well, the journey matters too, so I hope to see progress with these shots every month.
All pictures are my own, taken with my Sony RX10 III camera. I'm very new with the camera and still learning so any tips are always welcome in the comment section.
Loved these 🌕 shots. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for stopping by, hopefully next month they will be much better :)
Moons (and stars in general) are so difficult to capture in my opinion because not only you need to do the proper settings but also a lot of times you'll also need other tools like tripods (or any other platforms where the cam can stand on) and maybe a zoom lens although not necessary. I tried it before and I find it very difficult so I gave up haha. It is especially difficult in a very dark sky. You did a great job and I like the first shot, those clouds give a "Twilight" vibe haha.
It takes a lot of practice to be able to get more details and stuff so don't be too hard on yourself especially you're new to the camera as well. Good luck and hope you find the right settings and stuff soon before the next full moon. :D
Yes I figured that stars and the milky way would be hard as well. We have a very good natural park 30 mins from here and today I was told that it doesn't matter when you come, if it's clear you can see the milky way there. That's quite cool to know once I understand how to capture that, that I will have a beautiful spot near.
I'm surprised you think it's still an ok picture, I think only seeing the details is ok-ish but it was really the best one this round. It's a learning curve so I don't mind sharing the less good ones too.
Thanks for stopping by and have a good weekend!
There will be other super moons! Practice really does make perfect with playing with your settings to get the exposures just right. I tripod will help a lot for longer exposures, so it's not a bad investment. Little by little it will get easier and you'll catch those epic shots!
I've not played with my camera in years though, I'm way beyond rusty!
!PIMP
Yes sure there will be, I just hoped that I could do better this soon but I didn't have time to practice enough.
We didn't buy a tripod right away as we knew we still had one but it turned out that it's not good enough for such a heavy camera. I will look for one soon as it will surely help ..
!PIMP