Confusing objects around the moon

[Tim353]

Hi folks, I'm new here...I'm a photographer based in south east Spain & took some pictures of the moon this week... I wonder if anybody has an idea as to what the objects are that surround the moon in this picture? I can't believe that they are caused by lens flare, the purple circle looks solid...taken on a Nikon D300 with 70-300mm zoom...

[Mr TamiyaCowboy]

looks very very like lens flare.

very overexposed to, you want to be shooting around 1/125s to around 1/200s

[Space Bat]

Zoom lenses on a v.bright object will do this due to the many object lenses in the optic plane...internal reflections - typically the construction of these lenses where the edges of the lenses are not blackened will cause many types of flaring

[JamesM]

Hi Tim and welcome to the forum. I agree with the consensus so far that it certainly looks like a lens artifact rather than lunar phenomena.

Clear skies

James