Gary,

Sure looks like you took your shot at the same stage of the eclipse as I did.

I see in my moon shots, not just tonight - all of them, exactly what you describe but I don't think it is a focus problem. I believe it's pixelation. A 300mm lens seems awfully big but that's still a very small part of the image. When cropped down it starts getting fuzzy.

Rusty

You may be right and I am using a VR lens at 300mm. I think it's got to be more than that though. It might be noise, but I took several shots at 200, 400, and 800. They all seem just a bit blurry. Perhaps it's a little of bit of this and that.

I'll have to look into what the real experts know rather than what I can speculate.

Hi people,
It was alternately overcast/hazy/atmosphery enough that I couldn't do any good tonight. Therefore I get to play expert.

In addition to all the other problems that have been discussed, don't forget that the Moon is a moving target, and the long exposure necessary for shadow pictures make it hard to get a sharp picture. More than one site I've read says that good eclipse photography requires a telescope with a tracking mount. Also, eclipse or not, the full moon is pretty much front lit and there aren't the shadows of craters and mountains to provide depth and texture.

Gary and Rusty, you've both done as much as can be expected without a Great Big Lens or a telescope. My most successful moon pic was shot in the Fall, with clear skies and the moon was as close to right overhead as it ever gets. I still needed a fair amount of PP to make an acceptable image.

Steve

Steve,
I think the VR should have taken care of most of the motion blur. I was only exposing for .8 sec in the shot I posted.

Gary, were you using a tripod? If so, VR should be turned off when mounted on a tripod. Good article on the subject here:

http://digital-photography-school.com/b ... n-tripods/

I didn't get a single shot. It was cloudy and then I thought I would wait a little while and check again..........NOPE.......zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!! I fell asleep

Hi Gary,
I don't think I explained very well in my post above. I was referring to motion blur caused by the Moon's motion. That would make it pretty tough to get a really sharp picture when using a slow shutter speed.

My camera has "shake reduction" built in to the sensor, so it supposedly works with any lens. Even with SR, I can't reliably hand-hold below about 1/10sec. Of course, I'm sort of a geezer, so maybe that's it.

Steve

You gotta be a real rock to hand hold at 1/10 sec and get a clear shot of anything, even with VR / IS, no matter what your age.

I wonder if the blurring your seeing in your moon shots is caused as much by the atmosphere as anything else. Your reaching out an awful long way to begin with, and the constant movement of the upper atmosphere is what makes the stars appear to twinkle anyway.....

Just my 1/2¢ worth.

I was at work so couldn't do any pictures, although I did take about a minute to look.

Handheld without VR rule-of-thumb is 1 divided by the focal length. At 300mm you can hand hold only down to 1/300 second. VR will buy you two stops, so maybe 1/75 second. 1/8? Not likely....

There is a sort of long story to this shot, so you all are going to have to listen. From my family room window it was completely cloudy outside. DH comes home and asked me why I am not taking pictures of the moon. It's cloudy, I say. He says you can see it out front. Oh nuts, I am not set up. So I grab my camera with the 60mm lens on it and run out front, Yep, there it is. So braced against a tree, I start taking pictures. I have no idea what setting this one is on but at least I got one.