The full moon has always made us look away; and contemplating it peacefully in the summer nights has been pleasant too. Many times we have attempted, with our best intentions and our digital or analogical compact camera, make a good photo to the full moon: we place the camera on any solid surface, the car’s roof, a rock; focus, zoom as long as we can (often insufficient) and we shoot with the automatic shutter so that picture is not blurred; it lapses a couple of seconds, and now the surprises begin. If the shot (not the metering) has been made correctly, we will obtain a white perfect circle, bigger or smaller size, on a black bottom. This happens because we have used a matrix metering system, that is, it has been measured the whole scene, where the black color prevails, and the camera tries to compensate, but the moon is really brilliant against the rest of the scene, therefore it will be over exposed.

If we use the DSLR spot metering system or some prosumer compact cameras and we take a metering on the moon, we can discover that will read an exposure of 1/250 sec. and f 8, for ISO 100. This means that with a 50mm or a 100mm lens we can shoot handheld and obtain good results.

The ideal lens to use follows a very simple rule: as long as you can. In all ways, starting from 300mm lens, good quality moon images can be obtained. Starting from that focal, using a good tripod is mandatory. Add a remote shutter to reduce to minimum the possible movement.
In a 35mm negative, the moon measures 1mm if has been taken with a 100mm lens; 2mm if has been taken with a 200mm, and so on. In digital cameras depends on the correction factor and the sensor size.

The best atmospheric conditions to photograph the moon are naturally a clear sky and cloudless night, but it is also important to wait the moon is high in the sky, because the atmosphere layer (that distorts light) is smaller when it is vertical, for obvious reasons.

The best results are obtained when the moon is photographed with a telescope. Better a refractor telescope. We can couple an adapter between the ocular and camera obtaining focal longitudes of 800, 900 or 1000mm. In this case we will have to work faster, because the moon moves an equivalent distance to its diameter every 2 minutes approximately.

Pictures like this can obtained with a telescope:

 

 

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