posted 01-08-2014 05:37 AM               

• Put your tripod on solid surface or on a soft surface, put spikes onto the legs of your tripod, then attach your kit bag or a good weight to the centre post of the tripod to help stop vibration getting to your camera and if you have one, keep the dog (I have one and have come up with some odd photos with him hitting the tripod) inside the house.

• Fit a remote control or cable release to your camera, at the end of the day it all comes down to vibration, the more you can do to stop it the better the photos you'll get.

  take your lens off Auto focus and put it on manual, as it will not work on the moon as its to far away.

• If you have an equatorial mount fitted to your tripod, great use it for this. Put the moon in the center of the viewfinder and start it up and off you go. If not (I do not have one) looking through the viewfinder set the shot up with the moon on the lefthand side and a bit below the centre the viewfinder, you can now take a good number of shots without moving the camera as the moon will go up and to the right as you shoot. You will have to do some picture cropping to get it in the center, but you'll be using Photoshop a far bit on you photos.

• As to setting you need to put in to the camera: put it on programme, P. As to aperture and shutter speeds you'll have to experiment with them as the phases of the moon put out more or less light and this will throw your setting off.

• Have a pc or laptop nearby so you can take a few photos, take the card out and put it in the laptop to see what you have taken. Please do not use the back of the camera as you can put your back out looking at it at that angle and you have a bigger screen to see your photo to see if the camera is in focus or not, this can take some time to do.

• As the moon is so far away and you are looking through a hole 3/4" wide the focus will give you some trouble. You can now adjust the camera to fit, you'll have to do this a number of times but stick to it and you`ll get some good shots.

• Times to get good shots of the moon are; when it in a crescents and quarters as you get more surface detail at the edge of the moon at this time. With a full moon the sun has a tendency to wash out the surface detail as you now have to much light come in the the photo.

• And one last thing, use the biggest lens you can get hold off.

posted 01-08-2014 06:59 AM               

1. If your camera has a mirror lockup option use it. It will eliminate the vibration caused by the mirror "slap".

2. You can accurately gauge your exposure by using the histogram function on you LCD screen.

posted 01-08-2014 05:15 PM               

From Canon I have a 18-50mm EFS lens that came with my 300D.

To go with the MC MTO-11CA 10/1000mm lens I have an APS VARIABLE AUTO TELEPLUS 2X-3X converter plus a Soligor 2x teleconverter.

I find that with only four lens I have is all I need to do the semi-pro photography I do for magazines in the UK on the subject of fast-jet, airshow, motorbikes and trikes. I do promo work for the companies I work for, to go on there web pages. And I only have to use three lens most of the time.

I find that the 50-500mm one is the one I use the most as I do not have to swop it over with a small or larger lens to get a shot five feet away me or one three miles away as you get it all in the one lens.

Back to photos of the moon.

The lens you use is up to you be I would only go as small as an 125mm and go up from there. And with a good photoshop program even the small photo you get with a 125mm lens you can zoom in a good way now to get the shot you like.

posted 01-08-2014 07:10 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by butch wilks:
What is a histogram and how do I find it on a Canon 300D and use it please?

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posted 01-08-2014 07:13 PM            

I have read quite a bit online about taking photos of the moon but there's nothing quite like getting out there yourself and experimenting.

My tips would be to get a sturdy tripod and to use a remote or the timer to eliminate shake.

Get a good size lens, I managed to get some good shots with a 300mm but a 400mm or 500mm would obvisously be better. The best images I took were at 1/125 F5.6 to F10 ISO 250 using spot metering but your settings will depend upon what kind of moon phase you are trying to capture.

posted 01-10-2014 02:28 AM               

If you have a long lens with a small front end, you get very small amount of light go in to it and end up with dark photos. With a big front end you get more light going in so lighter photos.

Have a look at a football match on tv and look at the photography cameras and you`ll see some really big lenses.

But you do not have to go that far, as the ones they have cost thousands of pounds. But you can get one with a bit smaller front ends for about £200. Look for a lens with a front end of 3" to 6" or better.

A mirror lens is good as it not so long and has a big front end or a zoom lens with a good sized front end, but they can be a bit long, so look for one with a tripod mount fitted to the lens for better balance on your tripod.

Telephoto lenses from 200mm to 500mm are long and have a fixed focus length, i.e. you cannot zoom in on things. The front end can be as small as 1.5" to 3" but most have a tripod mount fitted.

I think the best ones to look at are the mirror lens and the zoom lens, they may cost a bit more but in the end you get a better lens for the job your looking to use it on.

In my time I've used most lenses: telephotos, zooms and mirrors.

I started off with a small Kodak 110 instamatic taking photos at an airshow (not good, all I got was a black dot in the sky). Going on to a second hand Praktica SLRs with a 125mm on to a 300mm and then on to a 500mm telephoto lens (still a bit small but a lot better then the 110, but not as good as a zoom lens and I had to swap over the lens a lot too with the telephoto lens (from the 500mm to the 50mm and then back to the 500mm and so on, but not with a zoom). I used to go through 12 36x frame films at a two day show.

Then I got my first new camera and on to digital too, the Canon 300D I now have. I had to upgrade my lenses at the time too. I add a battery pack to the camera to go all day at a show, and I've not looked back as I now do a lot of work with the set up I have.

I would like to upgrade to the Canon 7D but for now its the old 300D for me.

posted 01-11-2014 09:12 AM               

A mirror lens can be an economical way to get a long lens on you camera but there are some drawbacks. The most impactful is it has a fixed f-stop, so you can't adjust it for the lighting conditions.

posted 01-15-2014 01:51 PM               

To see the histogram on most Canon DSLRs you need to keep pressing the DISP or display button, this should bring it up on the screen. I haven't used a 300D for a long time so can't remember if it had a Live View monitor. It may be that you can only see the histogram when you review the images on the back screen. Don't worry about it too much, with lunar photography it's not much use, trust your eyes, if it looks too bright it probably is.

You really only need a lunar filter for optical viewing as the moon is so bright, for photography it's just a case of dialing in a smaller aperture or a shorter shutter time to dim the moon.

To fill the frame on your camera with the lunar disc would take a LARGE lens, and a hefty mount to steady it. For the price you would pay you could get a nice small motor driven telescope and purchase what is called a T2 mount. You wouldn't believe how quickly the moon drifts out of frame with a fixed mount and high magnification.

Finally, focusing is the hardest thing about astrophotography, prepare for lots of slightly out of focus images. But persevere, it's not like your cant format the card and try again!