The Moon, April 16, 2008, 6:33 PM or soI stepped outside to get some photos of the Moon on Wednesday, because I wanted to. This photo was taken with my Nikon Coolpix L4. Compare to this photo taken in April 2005 with my old digital camera.
(For added fun, compare these photos with this photo, taken in November 2005. Notice the difference in size and shape of Mare Crisium, the small oval seen at the top of today's image and the April 2005 image and much more prominently visible at the 2:00 position of the November 2005 photo and the photo below. Why does it look different? Libration, baby! Check it out! The cool motion that lets us view 59% of the Moon's surface!)
Today the Moon is waxing gibbous, more nearly Full. Soon it will move to within one degree of Mars, something I meant to mention earlier. But looking at the Moon a few hours ago, I noticed something about it that I've noticed for several years.
It looks sepia-toned to me.
The Full Moon, something like how I see it. Modified version of image taken from http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/details.php?gid=165&sgid=&pid=1750
I don't know when it was that I first noticed this. I think it was sometime in 1997 or 1998, when my grandmother was in her final nursing home. I stepped out into the parking lot one night as I was heading home, looked at the rising Full Moon, did a little trick with my optical perception, and wham - a Sepia Moon. Or copper-on-lemon. Or brown-on-white.
It's weird. I wonder if its indicative of something wrong with my eyes, or if it's a trick of seeing what you expect to see, or if I'm actually seeing the true color of the Moon. Does anyone else see the Moon like this? Does everyone? I have no idea. I'd be interested in finding out.
In the meantime, there's a conjunction of the Moon and Mars coming up tonight! I'll try to get photos.
Both photos look pretty crappy to me, you should invest in a real camera...
ReplyDeleteThanks for your feedback. I'm not sure which pictures you're referring to when you say "both", since I display one photo of my own, link to two others by me, and desplay another from a free download website.
ReplyDeleteToo bad you've chosen to remain anonymous. I would be interested in seeing what kind of lunar photos YOU have taken with YOUR digital camera.
I bet you were waxing something while you were taking that picture!
ReplyDeleteDoes it look this way to you all of the time?
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that the moon changes color throughout the year. Like say the harvest moon almost always being orange.
Whim, yep, pretty much any time the Moon is Full or nearly so, this is the color it looks to me, regardless of its position in the sky. The Harvest Moon does usually look orange as it rises, but this is a separate effect.
ReplyDelete