2019 Super Wolf Blood Moon Eclipse

This year, I was really looking forward to the Super Wolf Blood Moon, whew…., eclipse! I’ve recently acquired a “new-to-me” Nikon D750 and could not wait to get it pointed towards the sky! Only problem, a lens. I did not have a lens that would do the job. That’s where Mike’s Camera, a local camera shop here in Colorado Springs, came in. I was able to rent a Tamron 100 - 400 lens.

I stepped outside, on the night prior to the eclipse, and shot a few handheld images curious as to what I could get and assuming whatever it was would be better once I placed the camera on a tripod. Now, the moon can be challenging enough to take a picture of without doing it handheld. One of the main reasons for this is the fact that the camera lens is zoomed so far out that any movement is highly exaggerated causing self-generated motion blur. It also doesn’t help that the moon is moving casing motion blur.

Practice shot of the moon the night prior to the eclipse

The camera that I was shooting, before the Nikon D750, was the Nikon D5600*. I still love my D5600 and plan to use it quite often on many of my backpacking adventures. As a matter of fact, there isn’t an image, as of this writing, on this website that came from my D750. They’ve all been from the D5600.

Final Composite of the Super Wold Blood Moon Prints Available here: SWBM Image

The above composite image is the result of over four hours of photography on a crisp snow-covered evening. At the end of this blog is another composite I later played around with. Like it? Let me know in the comments…!

Image #1 | Nikon D750 | 1/250s | f-6.3 | ISO 100 | 400mm

After checking my PhotoPills App, I realized that the eclipse was going to be happening directly above me. Getting a shot of the moon, during the eclipse, along with any foreground was going to be difficult. With that in mind, I simply shot from my backyard in Monument, Colorado.

I really wanted to start the night off with a nice shot of the moon on the horizon, but it seemed Mother Nature had other ideas for the weather. Initially, I was concerned that the entire evening was going to be under a thin layer of cloud cover. This cloud cover blocked any chance of a shot of the moon out over the horizon. Luckily, the clouds dissipated just prior to me taking Image 1.

Image #2 | Nikon D750 | 1/250s | f-6.3 | ISO 100 | 400mm

Image number two was taken just as the moon began entering into the Earth’s shadow. This would be the last shot taken with a low ISO for reasons unclear to me. I guess my brain froze. I generally like to keep the ISO as low as possible. It is definitely a balancing act between shooting a moving object, shutter speeds and ISO levels.

Image #3 | Nikon D750 | 1/160s | f-6.3 | ISO 160 | 380mm

I did not realize it at the time, but either the lens slipped or I bumped it because it went from a full 400mm down to 380mm. In the end, this was probably okay as I doubt the lens is that sharp at a full extension. On the other hand, I doubt moving it from 400mm to 380mm helped me much in regards to sharpness.

Image #4 | Nikon D750 | 1/160s | f-6.3 | ISO 640 | 380mm

In Image #4, the moon is almost totally engulfed in the Earth’s shadow. At this point, the amount of light reflecting off of the moon was beginning to drastically drop which called for another ISO bump.

Image #5 | Nikon D750 | 1/20s | f-6.3 | ISO 2500 | 380mm

Image #5 has the slightest amount of sunlight reflecting off of it. The moon was entering the longest of the phases of this particular eclipse where it hung out in the Earth’s shadow for quite a while. With that being said, it was really time to give the ISO a bump.

Ever notice how the morning and evening sun is often orange / red? This happens, to put it simply, as sunlight enters the Earth’s atmosphere at a low angle causing the blue light-waves to be scattered about leaving the red end of the spectrum to be able to pass through alone, hence the reddish color. The light reflecting off of the moon, while the moon is in the Earth’s shadow, isn’t much different. In this case, the low angled light, having had the blue rays scattered about leaving the red end of the spectrum to pass through, takes a very long path through the Earth’s atmosphere before hitting, and then reflecting off, the moon’s surface.

Image #6 | Nikon D750 | 1/10s | f-6.3 | ISO 3200 | 380mm

The moon is fully engulfed in the Earth’s shadow as seen above in Image #6. I thought it was pretty interesting seeing the moon under these circumstances, tho a bit eerie at the same time. Also interesting was how bright it was outside under the full moon and how dark it became when the moon was in eclipse. Anything but boring.