Lunar super eclipse Sept. 27th. 2015

AI Thread Summary
The Lunar super eclipse on September 27, 2015, was a rare event not set to occur again until 2033, generating significant excitement among enthusiasts. Many participants shared their experiences and challenges with weather conditions, with some unable to view the eclipse due to clouds or haze. Photography was a common theme, with users discussing equipment and techniques, while others expressed frustration over missed opportunities for clear shots. Questions about the eclipse's visual phenomena, particularly the sudden color change of the moon, sparked informative discussions among members. Overall, the thread highlighted a blend of anticipation, technical challenges, and community sharing of experiences and images related to the eclipse.
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Argggh! Rain forcast for the entire weekend here. :oldfrown:
 
Borg said:
Argggh! Rain forcast for the entire weekend here. :oldfrown:

Here, too...
 
I'm ready to drive to the high desert with my solar panels and kid here but so far the Portland area still has a clear weather window for that day in the forecast.
 
Not very clear as I was with the wife and her friend picking herbal medicines on a hill with just my crappy tablet camera.

Moon rise near Mt. Hood on the day before the Super Blood Moon.
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Unfortunately, not going to see the eclipse from Australia
didn't see the last 3 because of cloud, now we have a clear sky but the eclipse isn't visible from this region ( whole Pacific basin)
 
This is not fair! I live in singapore and it is currently covered in haze and cannot see the clouds.:(
 
here's the Super Moon, 30 mins ago from Sydney, just a few hours away from full
waiting till midnite 'ish time for full isn't going to happen haha and also much harder to photo as it will be pretty much directly overhead ( just a little west of)

Canon 5D mk3 with the 100 - 400mm telephoto Canon EF 100–400mm lens and a x2 teleconverter giving 800mm, 320th sec, ISO500, f11
2015_09_27_4223sm.gif


Dave
 
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  • #10
The forecast in my area is now cloudy to mostly cloudy. Maybe there will be a chance.
 
  • #11
If I am awake that late I'll try to take some pictures of it (with my comparatively shoddy equipment)...:-p Edit: The forecast in my area is excellent, but the forecast of my sleepiness is uncertain. Hopefully my photographic desire will prevail...:smile:
 
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  • #12
7pm and I have clear skies directly overhead. Maybe I'll get lucky at 10 pm.
 
  • #13
The weather conditions at my location are absolutely perfect right now. But my camera is not :cry: :smile:. But I will definitely take some photos when it's time.
 
  • #14
The moon started to move into the partial shadow now.
 
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  • #15
mfb said:
The moon started to move into the partial shadow now.
I confirm that from my position :smile:.
 
  • #16
Houston, I'm getting pictures from my shoddy equipment. Will post here later. Is the Moon really there when nobody is looking? Don't know, but it is definitely there since I'm looking at it at the moment. EDIT: Gosh, it's getting really beautiful at the moment! :woot:
 
  • #17
Will the world FINALLY end this time? I'm getting so tired of waiting.
 
  • #18
Horrible conditions here. Just getting the tiniest peeks between large groups of clouds.
 
  • #19
Borg said:
Horrible conditions here. Just getting the tiniest peeks between large groups of clouds.
I'm sorry...
 
  • #20
DennisN said:
I'm sorry...
Me too. Looks like I'll have to count on seeing everyone else's pictures.
 
  • #21
Algr said:
Will the world FINALLY end this time? I'm getting so tired of waiting.
Blood moon and the world is still there... at least here.
Nice to watch, just a bit of fog here.
 
  • #22
Borg said:
Me too. Looks like I'll have to count on seeing everyone else's pictures.
I will have some to post in this thread later. But they are only from a basic digital camera, 10x optical zoom, 40x digital zoom.
 
  • #23
A sneak preview (hopefully I will have some better...):
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  • #24
I got out of an indoor soccer game with about 15min to go and it was really nice!
 
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  • #25
The clouds drifted off so...
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  • #26
Held Fair Anne's Ipad up to telescope eyepiece

looking forward to you guys's good photos

Eclipse2.JPG
 
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  • #27
The full eclipse is over, the LHC has been running the whole time (http://press.web.cern.ch/backgrounders/cern-answers-your-queries-about-23-september-2015), and the world didn't end yet.
Something went wrong! We have to wait until October 7th for the next end of the world.
 
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  • #28
mfb said:
The full eclipse is over, the LHC has been running the whole time (http://press.web.cern.ch/backgrounders/cern-answers-your-queries-about-23-september-2015), and the world didn't end yet.
At least in the MWI branch we are at the moment...
 
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  • #29
A short break in the clouds:

DSC00506_zpsbdlabmrj.jpg
 
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  • #30
Andy Resnick said:
A short break in the clouds:
Beautiful!

EDIT: I'm off to bed now. It's nice seeing photos coming in. I'm thinking of maybe doing some montage with the different phases of the eclipse, I took a load of photos. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow and post here later. I wish you all a good night!
 
  • #31
Cloudy. Boo. Just a few mediocre pics through little breaks. I have yet to see all of a lunar eclipse in my life.
 
  • #32
We have ok conditions.

I went back to the view point of yesterday and the place was a madhouse of people with equipment. Had to leave early before they closed the gates at the bottom on the butte.

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There was too much light for good shots of the blood moon rise over the mountain early today. My best early shot.

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It was left of those houses but was too faint to get a shot until it was much darker and higher up. Poor Hood has almost no snow now..
 
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  • #33
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  • #34
Beautiful photos guys! I've got one physical question regarding lunar eclipses.

I know that the moon turns red because of the sunlight passing through our atmosphere which absorbs other frequencies and bending the red wavelength to the moon's direction. But why is it that the moon immediately turns red all of it at once only when it's mostly behind Earth's shadow? I'd expect that as Earth's shadow consumes the moon, the red colored moon surface would gradually increase until it's all red. Instead, the moon is partly black first by Earth's shadow until it's almost completely black just to turn all red immediately. Why is that?
 
  • #35
thanks for everyone posting their pix :smile:
 
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  • #36
davenn said:
thanks for everyone posting their pix :smile:
Same here. Glad to see that some of the PF'ers were successful in seeing it.
 
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  • #37
JohnnyGui said:
Beautiful photos guys! I've got one physical question regarding lunar eclipses.

I know that the moon turns red because of the sunlight passing through our atmosphere which absorbs other frequencies and bending the red wavelength to the moon's direction. But why is it that the moon immediately turns red all of it at once only when it's mostly behind Earth's shadow? I'd expect that as Earth's shadow consumes the moon, the red colored moon surface would gradually increase until it's all red. Instead, the moon is partly black first by Earth's shadow until it's almost completely black just to turn all red immediately. Why is that?
It is red all the time, but due to the high contrast it is hard to see that until most of it is in the shadow.
It's like trying to see stars during the day: they are there - but you don't see them as the sky and everything else is too bright so your eyes don't adapt to darkness sufficiently.
 
  • #38
Happy to share what I have.

Actually, I got really lucky- and not because of the weather. The internal mirror of my camera became detached from its bracket just after setup, and I decided to run the risk of permanent damage by taking photos anyway. Focus and aiming were completely blind, and the image I posted was both the only well-focused one and also the last one before the mirror got stuck in the shutter. Fortunately, this morning I (carefully) removed the mirror and the camera turned on normally. The mirror is now re-epoxied down and the patient is resting comfortably.
 
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  • #39
mfb said:
It is red all the time, but due to the high contrast it is hard to see that until most of it is in the shadow.
It's like trying to see stars during the day: they are there - but you don't see them as the sky and everything else is too bright so your eyes don't adapt to darkness sufficiently.

Thanks for the answer. So are you saying that when we see a part of the moon in Earth's black shadow, that part is actually red?
 
  • #40
Well, the "shadow" is red. See post 29 where the red part is clearly visible as the image has enough dynamic range.
 
  • #41
mfb said:
Well, the "shadow" is red. See post 29 where the red part is clearly visible as the image has enough dynamic range.

Ah, ok, I can see it's already partly red indeed before the moon is completely behind the shadow. What made me ask this question was the following video:


At 0:15 you'll hear the guy explaining that the moon has to be fully black first before it immediately pops in a red color instead of red gradually taking over. That's what surprised me. His explanation after that didn't make it clear for me why that happens but your explanation about red having a stronger contrast only when the moon is almost dark made sense to me.
 
  • #42
DennisN said:
It's nice seeing photos coming in. I'm thinking of maybe doing some montage with the different phases of the eclipse, I took a load of photos. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow and post here later.

I did a montage which I post below. Regretfully I could not take any good closeup of the Moon when the eclipse was at maximum; my camera could not focus, which I guess was because the available light was too dim. Note: The Moon did not change size during the eclipse, I've just been a little sloppy when I did the image :smile:.

21632003060_4d7ef0b691_b.jpg
 
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  • #43
JohnnyGui said:
At 0:15 you'll hear the guy explaining that the moon has to be fully black first before it immediately pops in a red color instead of red gradually taking over. That's what surprised me. His explanation after that didn't make it clear for me why that happens but your explanation about red having a stronger contrast only when the moon is almost dark made sense to me.

To our very insensitive to colour eyes, and particularly to red ( hence why we astronomers use red lights to illuminate our gear etc when
under the stars) light, we see it as very dark to black till totality.
But a camera being more colour sensitive across the spectrum will pic up that red colour (as seen in the photos) long before our eyes doDave
 
  • #44
DennisN said:
I did a montage which I post below.

sweet set, well done :smile:

DennisN said:
Regretfully I could not take any good closeup of the Moon when the eclipse was at maximum; my camera could not focus, which I guess was because the available light was too dim.

Big, huge, major, mega ( is that enough :wink: ) hint ... NEVER use auto focus ALWAYS use manual focus
for any and all astro photography

Dave
 
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  • #45
davenn said:
Big, huge, major, mega ( is that enough :wink: ) hint ... NEVER use auto focus ALWAYS use manual focus
for any and all astro photographyDave

Thanks :smile:. Regretfully my basic camera lacks manual focus. Hopefully I will have a better camera in the future. And a telescope :smile:.
 
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  • #46
DennisN said:
Thanks :smile:. Regretfully my basic camera lacks manual focus. Hopefully I will have a better camera in the future. And a telescope :smile:.

all ok ... yeah many point and shoots and similar are like that
Regardless you made an awesome effort, and I encourage you to keep experimentingNow for a little laugh ...
A friend did this composite...
and labelled it, a very rare event, a double eclipse :wink:

double eclipse.jpg
haha a good laugh :)Dave
 
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  • #47
I took a few pics with an ordinary but quite good digital camera.
Although I tried to get away from background streetlights and stuff I think that general light pollution was a problem.
They might come out OK though if I mess a round with photoshop a bit.
Visually for me in Ireland it was less impressive than I had hoped for.
Visibility was clear but it just looked like an ordinary full moon gone dark, not very noticeably red
 
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  • #48
DennisN said:
Note: The Moon did not change size during the eclipse, I've just been a little sloppy when I did the image
I did a somewhat less sloppy version, but the full eclipse pic is eh, somewhat pixelated :eek::biggrin:, I have not got any better photos than these. I hope to see more photos from others in this thread, don't be shy...:wink:

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  • #49
rootone said:
I took a few pics with an ordinary but quite good digital camera.
Although I tried to get away from background streetlights and stuff I think that general light pollution was a problem.
They might come out OK though if I mess a round with photoshop a bit.
Visually for me in Ireland it was less impressive than I had hoped for.
Visibility was clear but it just looked like an ordinary full moon gone dark, not very noticeably red

look forward to seeing a couple from you :)

Dave
 

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  • #50
DennisN said:
Hopefully I will have a better camera in the future. And a telescope :smile:.

Gosh, if you lived a bit closer, I would give you my Pentax K10 DSLR free :smile:
its been sitting around for ~7 yrs not being used, even the Pentax K7 doesn't really get much use any more
My wife took over the K5 when I bought the Canon gear 3 yrs ago
I would supply the camera, you could buy a reasonable new or second hand telephoto lens
I have bought reasonable camera gear at pawn shops in yrs gone by

Dennis, if you were seriously interested, and you were in a position to spend some money on a telephoto lens ?
I could do an enquiry at a post office and see if it would be worth posting it to you ... mite cost more than it's worth LOL

Dave
 

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