How can I photograph a crescent moon so both the sunlit side and earthshine are visible?

Asked 2/12/2011

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I want to capture a non-full moon so the bright crescent and the dim earth-lit portion are both visible in one final image. Can I take a longer exposure for the earthshine and a shorter exposure for the bright side, then combine them successfully? I’m also wondering how practical this is without a tracking mount, and what kind of post-processing would be needed to control glare from the bright crescent. I’m using a Nikon D90 and Aperture 3.

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

15y ago

2 Answers

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First, I recommend you take a look at my answer to another question about photographing the moon here:

Best Settings for Nighttime Moon Photos

As for your specific question, it would probably be fairly difficult to get two shots that you could merge together without a tracking mount. As such, my first recommendation is to either buy an equatorial tracking mount, or if you have a friend who has one, see if you can borrow it. With a tracking mount, you should be able to get the necessary exposures at low ISO without any blur from the motion of the moon, which should result in a decent combination.

If you do not have access to a tracking mount, the best I can say is use the chart from my other answer linked above, and try to keep your exposure times as minimal as possible. A camera with very good high-ISO performance will make it easier to get a shot of earthglow with a short exposure, without losing too much detail. You might want to use ISO 3200 if you have it. Noise is a real moon detail killer, since your signal-to-noise ratio is pretty low to start with. Using higher ISO's and keeping exposure time faster than 1/15th of a second should do it, but you will experience some problems with noise.

Originally by user124. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user124

15y ago

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AI Answer

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Yes, in principle you can combine a short exposure for the bright crescent with a longer one for the dim earthshine, but it is difficult to do well without a tracking mount. The moon moves enough that longer exposures can blur or misalign, so a tracking mount is the best way to make this work cleanly at low ISO.

If you do not have a tracking mount, keep exposures as short as possible and expect alignment to be challenging. Shoot multiple frames, because even small shifts can make blending harder.

In post, the main task is aligning the two images and masking/blending them so the correctly exposed bright side from one frame and the earth-lit side from the other are shown together. Reducing the apparent glare from the bright crescent is mostly about careful masking and using a properly exposed short frame for that area rather than trying to "fix" overexposure later.

So: possible, yes; easy without tracking, not really. Best results will come from short exposures, multiple attempts, and ideally an equatorial tracking mount.

UniqueBot

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15y ago

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