Moonlapse

Settings
The moonlapse was taken with a f4.5 aperture / 1200 iso / 25" exposure / 60" interval / fluorescent WB / variable ND Filter @ 1.25 stops / JPEG format / Nikon 18-55mm lens set to 18mm

Technique
This was my first go at a moon and star timelapse.  When I saw the full moon, bright stars and clear skies I got excited to shoot my first one, and quickly learned many valuable lessons.  First the moon and stars are tough to capture.  For example if you walked outside and took a picture using automatic settings you will get the moon and a black sky.  This happens because the stars' light is very faint and the camera needs more time for that light to "burn" into the picture.  One way to combat this problem is to keep the open shutter for an extended length of time.  Since the moon was so bright I needed to soften its bright light so I applied a neutral density filter.  A neutral density filter is basically a dark piece of glass that tricks the camera into thinking it is darker that it really is.  As the moon's intense light enters into the camera it passes through the ND filter making the moon appear darker.  This is where some of my troubles and inexperience begin to show.  A problem in this shoot is that the moon is significantly over exposed or blown out.  Like stated before it is because the shutter is open for so long, but unfortunately I cannot capture the stars without the longer shutter.  If done properly and in a dark enough environment you can capture very faint light such as the milky way that may not be able to be seen by the naked eye.

Now for the rookie mistakes...interval between shots was WAY too short.  When a camera takes a photo it sends that information to the memory card to save the picture.  If taking normal pictures this happens very quickly.  However, when you take a long exposure (normally over 8 seconds) the camera applies a noise reduction process to the picture.  This adds anywhere from 5-10 seconds to the amount of time it takes the camera to send the picture to the memory card.  Unfortunately the camera is as bad at multitasking as I am and it cannot process a picture and take a new one at the same time.  Essentially the picture was not processed in the 5 seconds between pictures that I had set, which means the camera skips that picture and waits until the next one...30 seconds later.  When I went to get my camera a few hours later only 80ish pictures had been taken instead of the 200ish I was expecting.  Fewer pictures means shorter clips and choppier timelapses.

Thoughts and What's Next?
For my first moonlapse I was pleasantly surprised.  The moon's speed really caught me off guard, in just under 2 hours it moved nearly out of frame and the glow of Madison is more intense than I anticipated.  I have taken some notes and will need to find a darker place to try my next one hopefully when it isn't as cold!  I'm really focusing on longer shutter speeds right now.  I like how it blurs motion and really makes the timelapses feel less choppy.  The week coming up will be busy so planning what to shoot will be tough, Thanksgiving with the family and LA for USC vs UCLA.  Fortunately my sister is a photographer so we may be able to come up with something creative while I'm home, or even a timelapse of the game?!?

Hope you enjoyed the first post, don't forget to check out the vimeo channel in the links section.  I have a pretty cool timelapse of a candle melting I took this weekend there!  As always if you have any suggestions, ideas, thoughts or just want to say hi post in the comments below.  See you next week!

Still balding but not bald,
-Kyle