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What camera settings for pic of moon???


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Hello, i have just tried taking some pictures of the moon with my Sony alpha DSLR.

Every pic i have taken, just comes back as a blur.

Does anyone know what settings will work to get the best quality pic of the moon?

The settings i have tried to use is:

ISO:100

Aperture: f/11

Shutter Speed: 1/125s

Thank you

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Pretty fast settings for the moon as it's a lot brighter than you think when it's full and it's also moving fast. Start with settings about 125th / F8 and experiment from there.

/edit oops just read your post properly - if you're getting a blur at 125th (is this tripod mounted?) then I think your focusing must be off or vibration is ruining the shot.

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Try using your camera's self timer. Set it to about 10 seconds . This should give your mount time to settle before taking the picture. Also, if you have the option to lock your shutter, use it. I know with my Mak the vibration of the shutter is enough to cause a slight blur.

Hope this helps :(

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Hello, i have just tried taking some pictures of the moon with my Sony alpha DSLR.

Every pic i have taken, just comes back as a blur.

Does anyone know what settings will work to get the best quality pic of the moon?

The settings i have tried to use is:

ISO:100

Aperture: f/11

Shutter Speed: 1/125s

Thank you

I would experiment, a tripod is a must, aperture as wide as possible and then speed up the shutter until you get a decent image. Once you get to this point you can experiment with the aperture and tweak the shutter speed to suit. Also use the self timer or buy a cheap wired remote and use that.

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Craig, you don't mention what lens you're using. I'd go for ISO100, f/8 or wider open, and whatever the meter reading comes out with, you really want spot metering through, and aim for about 2/3 stop underexposed (means a faster shutter speed). The in body IS will help a lot too, handholder is very possible, I used to do that with my 55-250, but you need IS, and probably best to kneel and rest your elbow on your knee.

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Hello, i have just tried taking some pictures of the moon with my Sony alpha DSLR.

Every pic i have taken, just comes back as a blur.

Does anyone know what settings will work to get the best quality pic of the moon?

The settings i have tried to use is:

ISO:100

Aperture: f/11

Shutter Speed: 1/125s

Thank you

Did you remember to to turn the camera on? :(

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  • 3 years later...

I have the same camera and haven't had those difficulties.  Perhaps it's because I have a polarizer filter on my camera.  I have used the action shot and found it to work on moon shots.  Tripod for upclose.  Brightness of the moon  will need a lunar filter.  It's a great camera.

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I was experimenting with my 127 mak and Nikon D80 last night, I still need to sort focusing a little, but camera on manual and exposure around a sixth of a second looked about right.

:glasses1:

That seems exceptionally slow to me.  I put my 450D straight onto the visual back of my 127 Mak using a T-ring.  I find that around 1/200th gives me a histogram about half full, but I can only get away with such a slow shutter speed if I use the mirror lockup, otherwise I start to get ghosting due to the vibration when it moves.  Before using the mirror lockup I had to go for at least 1/500th and started out using 1/1000th.

The 127 is great for lunar images with a DSLR as the image completely fills the frame.  In fact sometimes it's a little too large and your tracking really needs to be good.

You might find this thread helpful (not just my posts, either): http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/184192-full-disc-lunar-imaging-with-a-dslr/

James

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Have you put everything on manual and set aperture, exposure and focus yourself.

The camera will not like anything like autofocus nor the metering.

The moon is likly not big enough for the autofocus and the same for any exposure metering.

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My latest full moon shot that filled the frame with my scope was ISO 100 1/500 f4.8. But my image with just the camera and my 22/55 lens was (the moon took up a small portion of the frame) was ISO 800 0.6" f6.3. So I think it depends how much of the moon you've got in the image.

On my canon, whilst looking in the live view, if the moon looks as if it's the right exposure it comes out over exposed. So when attached to the scope I'll adjust the settings so I can see it clearly in the live view to manually focus then increase the shutter speed in manual mode so it's much darker in the live view and experiment with a few shots.

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Richard, the correct exposure for the moon

Will always be the same (during the same phase), at the same focal ratio, irrespective of focal length, as the moon's brightness isn't going to vary. The exposure metre in the camera will produce different readings depending on the camera meeting mode and focal length, as short focal lengths will have a lot more dark in them that the camera meter will attempt to expose as grey ( when using the normal evaluative mode)

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Richard, the correct exposure for the moon

Will always be the same (during the same phase), at the same focal ratio, irrespective of focal length, as the moon's brightness isn't going to vary. The exposure metre in the camera will produce different readings depending on the camera meeting mode and focal length, as short focal lengths will have a lot more dark in them that the camera meter will attempt to expose as grey ( when using the normal evaluative mode)

Thanks John, well explained.

I suppose I was confusing the exposure of the whole image V just an image of the moon. I did use the manual mode with the short focal length to get a good average exposure for the whole image, whereas I exposed it less with the long focal length, as with this I was only imaging the moon.

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