This image, shot in December 2014 is a repeat of my previous full moon picture, taken back in 2012.
At first glance there's little to choose between the two, but a closer examination shows the latter image to have much better detail resolution and tonality.
So what's made the difference?
Well it's a combination of factors, based in equipment, technique and software improvements that have added together to give a much more pleasing (to my eye anyway) result the second time around.
Let's take a look in detail at those changes, starting with the equipment.
The only difference in the equipment used to take the original photos was that the early shot was taken with a Canon 5D full frame digital SLR, and this latest shot was taken with a Canon 6D full frame digital SLR.
There's a difference of only 1 in the model name of the camera, but there are significant differences in the technical specs of the cameras that made a real improvement in the quality of the original RAW files obtained.
First off there's the pixel count, with an increase from the 5D's 13MP to the 6D's 20MP.
This allows finer detail to be recorded, and with the moon only taking up a small percentage of the sensor's area, even with a 400mm lens fitted, those extra pixels make a visible difference.
Secondly there's live view, not available on the older 5D, but a feature on the newer 6D camera.
Live view, with 10X magnification enabled, allowed me to focus the lens precisely on the moon's surface. Something which was a bit hit or miss with my older 5D camera, with or without autofocus enabled.
Having a more accurately focused starting image meant that I could be much more gentle when sharpening the final image in post processing, thus avoiding some of the ugly sharpening artifacts visible in the older full moon image from 2012.
And thirdly there's the fact that the newer 6D camera produces a 14 bit RAW file, whereas the older 5D camera only managed a 10 bit RAW file.
Those extra bits make all the difference when you come to process the image, as there's much less noise in the shadow areas of the image which, in turn, means that you can underexpose the image in the camera, thus preserving the highlights, and then pull out decent detail in the shadow areas in post-processing without noise becoming an issue.
OK - moving on to the improvements in technique between the two images.
I've already touched on the improvements in focusing technique enabled by the Live View function of the Canon 6D, but another change in technique, helped by the improvement in camera technology, was that I took the later image with a much faster shutter speed of 1/125 sec as opposed to 1/15 sec for the older image.
This change of shutter speed has increased the sharpness of the original RAW file, by first of all reducing or eliminating the effect of camera vibration, and secondly by freezing more effectively the movement of the moon across the picture space while the camera shutter is open.
Both of these benefits, combined with improved focusing, resulted in a much sharper RAW photo than I took for the image back in 2012, which meant that much less post-process sharpening was needed to finish off this new image compared with the older one.
And finally there's post processing.
Like cameras, software is under constant development and improvement, and I certainly notice the difference now that I've upgraded from my original post processing software combo of Adobe Bridge, ACR and Photoshop CS2, to Adobe Lightroom 5 and Photoshop CC.
Combined with the 14 bit RAW files coming out of my new camera I find I can manipulate tonality and colours to a much greater degree without inducing ugly processing artifacts than I ever could before, and the shadow and highlight detail that's visible in this image, as opposed to the older 2012 moon photo, is testamant to that.
So all in all, I'm glad I re-visited this simple (or not so simple!) image of a full moon a second time. It's amazing how technology, and myself, have moved on.
Filename - moon full 10.jpg
Camera - Canon 6D
Lens - 100-400mm zoom @ 400mm
Exposure - 1/125sec @ f8, ISO100
Location - Sky above Mold
This image - 800x800px JPEG
Conversion - Adobe Lightroom
Comments - Tripod, mirror lockup and cable release used to prevent camera shake
All content copyright © Howard Litherland 2009-2024 unless otherwise stated.