16.6.11

Lunar eclipse Jun 2011

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A front was forecast to cross southern Denmark after an earlier promise of clear skies. At 55N the totality was taking place before moonrise. The eclipse would also be shorter than from viewpoints further south.

I spent a frustrating hour standing and staring at a strip of cloud travelling slowly across a very low moon. It was actually hovering between trees on the horizon for the first half hour. At times it was completely clear over much of the sky except where the invisible moon should have been! Only after 3/4 of an hour was there anything to see. Though I was determined not to miss any clearing. By the time it actually cleared only the last of the Earth's shadow was still covering the moon. 

The low line of sight was bound to put a lot more atmosphere (clouds) between the moon and my viewpoint compared with anything overhead. The eclipse was more than half over by the time I was able to recognise and capture the true disk of the moon. Until then it was just an occasional dim glow. Or oddly-shaped lighter blobs seen through gaps in the darker clouds. None of the images taken in the first 3/4 of an hour were worth sharing here. The later ones are bad enough!


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At midnight the Moon clouded over again so I went to bed. The last shot above was adjusted to bring out the clouds. All the previous shots were gamma reduced to minimise the clouds and the flare they caused.

All Images taken  with a Panasonic Lumix TZ7 digital compact camera on Auto2. Usually resting on a fence post to help with the long exposures. Mostly at full, or near full optical zoom. The images were then heavily cropped to get more image scale. The cloud and very low lunar altitude made it a complete waste of time to get any of the telescopes out. Most of the eclipse took place behind a neighbour's tree. So I would have had to drag a heavy mounting the length of the drive. Then have no mains power for the drives.

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