Timings for the Total Lunar Eclipse

OK, so it's not a Moon picture... but whilst the eclipse was going on, I thought I'd take my first look at Orion this season and got this image of the Orion Nebula.

Just to show, once again... you can get decent images of nebulae from London!

M42 Orion Nebula from Blackheath 28 September 2015 by Mike Meynell, on Flickr

Another attempt.

The battery went flat before totality, so my pictures are of the early part of the eclipse.

Congratulations to everybody for a) getting up and staying up at that time in the morning and b) capturing these images, and Mike, wow you've done it again, stunning!

It's not until you try taking one of these images that you realise how "challenging" it can be. Kris and I took a trip away to Venice this past weekend (wedding anniversary) but I was determined to have ago at photographing the eclipse, so I took my camera with me.  Set the alarm on Sunday night for 3 am and went to bed in hope. Woke up several times before the appointed hour, no moon, just cloud. When the alarm did go off, leaning out of the hotel window as far as was safe, result!  I could see the moon appearing and disappearing behind broken cloud and, by opening the window shutters as far as they would go, tucking the curtains behind the open windows, moving some furniture and squatting on the floor in the corner of the bedroom (all the while not trying to wake the misses) I could just get to moon in the camera's view when mounted on my none to sturdy tripod. But, as totally approached the clouds got thicker, just typical I thought.  However, wait, this was not an officially publicised Flamsteed event and just when I was about to call it a night and crawl back into bed, the clouds parted and there was the moon, almost at totality. By this time all my cursing at the camera and the clouds had woken "the better half" and we both spent a magical half hour watching the moon through totality, before the patchy cloud rolled in again and finally gave me an excuse to crawl back into bed.

Did managed to capture some images of the event but the camera must have taken offence at all my cursing and refused to focus or expose correctly. I will try and post something after I have seen if  Gimp can rescue anything.

OK, so it’s not a Moon picture… but whilst the eclipse was going on, I thought I’d take my first look at Orion this season and got this image of the Orion Nebula.

Just to show, once again… you can get decent images of nebulae from London!

[image removed]

Wow, stunning! So clean too. Definitely inspiring for doing deep space astrophotography in our London skies.

I too enjoyed seeing the Orion constellation during the eclipse. Well done for taking advantage of imaging the nebula at the time.

As regards your question, a lunar eclipse is different to a solar eclipse. The timings are the same everywhere, and you’d have to have been somewhere in East Germany to not see totality! I refer you to the NASA page here.

Notice that the Moon doesn’t go right through the middle of the umbra shadow, so there will always be brighter points around the limb, depending on what time you viewed the eclipse. From your image, I’d estimate that you took it after maximum eclipse, but before totality ended (say about 4am?).

Ah that makes sense, thanks for the explanation and diagram. No, that is the exact time of peak totality that I took that picture hence my question. I was using a 1100d which I bought second hand and while I was searching for my peak totality image, I noticed my damn camera time was 1 hour and 13 mins ahead! So my picture shows a time stamp of 5pm but it was actually 3:47pm.

that is the exact time of peak totality that I took that picture hence my question

I've taken another look at your image and realise why I thought it must have been after the maximum. It's because your Moon is slightly "tilted" to the right (by about 10-20 degrees) - your camera must have been at a slight angle.

It’s not until you try taking one of these images that you realise how “challenging” it can be

Love the story Clive, and I look forward to seeing any images that you're able to salvage. At least you managed to witness the eclipse, even if you you can't salvage any images. It definitely ranks as one of my favourite observing sessions.

Here's another image sent in by Ted Teece - a composite view of the eclipse taken from his garden... great stuff.

Another attempt.

The battery went flat before totality, so my pictures are of the early part of the eclipse.

Well done with your captures, Bill. Can you buy more batteries for your camera so you always have a charged one at hand when the one in your camera goes flat?

Here’s another image sent in by Ted Teece – a composite view of the eclipse taken from his garden… great stuff.

Excellent eclipse sequence, Ted! Really like the uniform exposures too.

...and we both spent a magical half hour watching the moon through totality, before the patchy cloud rolled in again and finally gave me an excuse to crawl back into bed....

Clive, great effort to catch the eclipse, love the suspenseful narrative as the clouds parted just in the nick of time 🙂

Tej,
I have three batteries for my camera. One holds a charge for a couple of minutes and then goes flat. Another has expanded and has to be pushed in and levered out (I did it once and have no intention of doing it again). The third is ok. I am still on the steep learning curve of how to use it. I got the camera second hand last month.
I am investigating extra batteries so, hopefully, the next event will produce better results.

Here’s another image sent in by Ted Teece – a composite view of the eclipse taken from his garden… great stuff.

Delighted to have a new name to add to the credits list in the monthly Flamsteed astrophotography video!

And you, too, Bill! I'll get get you into the video too!

I’ve taken another look at your image and realise why I thought it must have been after the maximum. It’s because your Moon is slightly “tilted” to the right (by about 10-20 degrees) – your camera must have been at a slight angle.

Ah, you know, I was pondering over what you said, as I was sure I had my camera straight but as I was assembling my eclipse sequence I realised why the image appears tilted...its because I was using an Alt-Az goto mount!

Normally that's a pain when it comes to imaging but by luck, the gradual rotation came in useful as a part solution to a problem I had. The problem was, I had a near complete sequence that was missing the final part, ie the full moon that appears at the end of the eclipse. So, I thought to make the sequence a circle so that it wraps around to the full moon that preceded the eclipse 🙂 And because of my Alt-Az natural rotation, I didnt need to rotate any of my images (a little less work is always welcome!)

Well this is the first time I have ever done any sort of collage and I really enjoyed the process, playing around with different patterns but in the end I had to do something about the "missing piece", thank the universe for circles.

https://flic.kr/p/yXZF9u

Well this is the first time I have ever done any sort of collage and I really enjoyed the process

Well, you've done it brilliantly, Tej. Really well done... a great sequence of images.

Now, here's a very different take on the lunar eclipse. A few people have commented to me on how different the eclipse looked to the eye in comparison to the camera lens. Obviously, our eyes are not as sensitive to red light, plus many of the images of the Moon in full eclipse are probably 5-10 second exposures... not something the eye can achieve!

Many of you will know the artist David Redfern, who is a long-standing Flamsteed member. There is a lovely article on his work on the old Flamsteed website, here: http://www.flamsteed.org/fasredf200702.htm .

Anyway, to quote David:

Although I wasn't with you on Blackheath, I was in my garden for totality, but my photos were rubbish. So, putting my artists hat on I enlisted the help of a peach and Photoshop and invented a passable image of what I saw in the early hours - what do you think?

The Moon seemed to be smouldering softly, like a fuzzy peach, an ember in the sky.

The image is titled "Peach of a Moon".

I think that’s a much better impression of what it looked like to the naked eye!

“Peach of a Moon”

That's brilliant! Love it! I'm only on a BlackBerry at the moment - does the pic click through to a high-res we can use in the video?

does the pic click through to a high-res we can use in the video?

Yep, sorry... my fault. Full res picture link is here: