The dark side of the moon

[I](Put on some early Pink Floyd music if you like.)[/I]

The lunar eclipse took place Wednesday night here in the States. But I had to cover basketball games on four consecutive nights this week, so this is my first free time to do my show and tell.

I was reminded of the eclipse as I was driving east to my game and saw the moon rising over the trees ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-sunset-2-08.jpg[/IMG]
Yes, the sky was purplish-pink--it was just after sunset.

I covered my game and went home. I knew what I wanted to do once I got back--get out my tripod and take some pictures from the back porch. As I neared home, I noted the temperature: -8F (-22C).

Well, that's pretty cold, all right, but look: This will be the last lunar eclipse visible here until late 2010. And it wasn't cloudy. I decided I wasn't going to let a little cold get in the way of some pictures.

It took some time to get the tripod and camera set up and to remember how to use a remote shutter release. By the time I got my first picture, the eclipse was already well under way. 8:33 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2033-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

8:47 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2047-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

I had adjusted the shutter speed (faster) to get some of the detail of the moon's surface. Now I adjusted it back (slower speed) to get the orange color of the shadowed lunar surface. 8:53 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2053-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

I was using a 55-200mm zoom lens. Even so, the moon was just a tiny part of the frame. It would have been nice to have a bigger zoom so the moon would really fill up the camera frame, and I wouldn't have to do a lot of enlarging. But that wasn't in the cards. This is the gear I have, so this is what I used. 8:56 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2056-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

Now the lighted part of the moon was really slipping away quickly. 9:01 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2101-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

And by 9:12 p.m., the total phase of the eclipse was under way ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2112-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

I was also looking around at the stars. Right to my south was Orion, the hunter. Could I get a picture of the constellation? I set the exposure for 20 seconds, pointed the camera in the right direction and pressed the shutter release. The result ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-Orion-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

Look at the middle of Orion's "sword," which hangs from his "belt." Those three nearly vertical stars. Right in the middle is the Orion Nebula. I enlarged the picture some more, adjusted the light, and I think I got the nebula ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-Orionclose-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

And if you want to see what the nebula really looks like, [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_Nebula"]check this out[/URL]. Please take a look. It is really beautiful. The Hubbell space telescope has taken some incredible images.

Anyway, by now I was freezing! My hands had gotten really cold, because I had to slip off my gloves from time to time to adjust the camera. Also, my tripod is good--but it's old. I got it about the time I got married. That's a few years ago. So it's hard to adjust the controls, which are a little wonky. Especially when your fingers are getting numb.

So after the total eclipse started, I went back inside for a while and warmed up. By the time I went back outside, it was 9:47 p.m., and the total eclipse was nearly over ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2147-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

I went back inside. I next went out at 10:15 p.m. ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2215-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

And before taking the final picture at 10:32 p.m., I went to a faster shutter speed to get the moon's surface details again ...
[IMG]http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b289/drdog/Lunar-2232-2-08.jpg[/IMG]

So if you missed the eclipse, if you were working, if it was cloudy, if you live on the wrong side of the earth or if you just plain forgot, that's what the eclipse was like. You will be happy, I'm sure, to hear that my hands defrosted nicely.