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The moon photo I ignored for 3 weeks made me mad at myself
Last month I pulled 214 shots of the full moon from my backyard and skipped the one that looked slightly blurry on screen. Turned out the "blur" was the earthshine hitting the terminator just right, so clear through my 8" Dob that it showed detail I usually only get from stacked images. Have any of you ever deleted a frame that ended up being the keeper, or am I the only one kicking myself?
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zara_hill462d ago
Small thing but earthshine isn't really what you were seeing at the terminator. Earthshine is the dim light bounced off Earth that lights up the dark part of the moon, so it shows up on the unlit side, not right at the edge where day meets night. What you probably caught was just the low angle sunlight raking across the craters there, which is exactly why the terminator is the best place to shoot anyway. That shallow light throws long shadows and makes peaks and rims pop in a way you never get on a full disk. So yeah, you tossed a good frame, but the reason is even cooler than you thought.
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