Eyewitnessing one cosmic event

— Posted inUncategorized — 1 min read

Unlike the much publicised Transit of Venus tomorrow, publicity about the partial lunar eclipse last night was scarce in media or Internet.

After missing out the annular solar eclipse event on 20 May, and with the hopeless weather forecast for the 6 June Transit of Venus, I had been hoping at least to catch this lunar eclipse.

We had a somewhat cloudy afternoon. And by evening, layers of clouds had rolled out over the sky. …

I had given up on holding much hope of seeing any moon. But when I looked out just before 10.30, the sky was clear.

This shot is the first successful shots of the eclipsing moon. With white balance set to Auto, the colour appears paler and bluer than what I saw.

It was a bit breezy but I was able to take some relatively motions-blur free pictures. (About one out of every 4 ;))

Now I can say I have witnessed at least one cosmic event in this cosmic eventful year of the Dragon. 😎

More lunar eclipse photos are uploaded to Fleeting Moments. Please take a look.

:coffee:

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  1. I think so, too :happy:I did try using tripod, but didn't have much luck with it. Handheld was the best option, even with the big lens.

  4. It really doesn't look great for the Transit of Venus observation tomorrow. Several scientists/ sci-writer people I follow on twitter have gone over to Gisbourne and tweeting weather there is not bad ATM. Hawkes Bay forecast is cloudy + windy. If you are very very lucky, you might have a chance, too, DH. 😉

  5. My tripod was unable to keep the position when I pin-pointed at the moon. If I persisted I might have been able to get it right eventually, but I would have also wasted time and missed the greatest eclipse. The tripod is dad's and good enough for normal photography needs. But I think my next photography wish-list item would be a good quality tripod.

  6. Originally posted by serola:

    moon is actually well lit object. So, handheld is not a bad option (0.003 sec)

    My eyesight is not that great and I sometimes find it's rather hard to focus accurately in the viewfinder. I wanted to use the live-view feature to make sure focus was accurate. But when the moon is off the centre metering field, the moon just became bright disk in live-view monitor, making it impossible to finetune the focus. :(Originally posted by serola:

    Very good shots

    Thanks. Came out surprisingly good. Glad I splashed out and got the big gun 😉

  7. Well, moon is actually well lit object. So, handheld is not a bad option (0.003 sec). Very good shots :hat:

  10. Its coming over all cloudy here too. I will nip out and have a look…

  11. Oh yes, if it was not cloudy it would probably look like that here :irked:

  14. Not fair, eh? South Island gets to play with snow. Aucklanders get to see the Transit. Don't we deserve better in lower/mid North Island? :awww:

  16. At least it is fairly warm today, but I think it is going to rain…

  18. Freezing here. Southerly rain + temp under 6°C Seems this'll be on its way to you.

  23. Originally posted by darkesthour:

    Blimey, its 19C here

    It's cold here too! :whistle::p .Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    I did try using tripod, but didn't have much luck with it. Handheld was the best option, even with the big lens.

    I've always found hand held was easier. Of course, that was when I was younger! I haven't handled a proper camera in a long time so I wonder how well I'd do now! :insane: .

  24. Originally posted by qlue:

    when I was younger!

    Forever young, aren't you? :jester:I've recently had a new pair of glasses made, with bifocal progressive lenses! Great in everyday use around home, when most of my needs are in close to mid distance. But when looking into the camera viewfinder and aiming up into the sky, the boundary is right middle of the field. So that's probably the reason why I'm having a bit of problem with fine manual focusing.

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