Wednesday, November 4, 2009

The Moon


It's time for another Everyday Adventurer spectacular! I finally have my first good pictures of the Moon! Do you want to know how I did it? Believe me, with my knowledge of photography, it didn't start off easy. Before I tell you the easy solution, I also have a few pieces of moon trivia that you might find interesting.

There is an interesting connection with the face of the Moon and a few famous things that are dear to me. I'll give you a bit of history. Anyone who has been reading this blog for awhile might know that my favorite music is the band Queen. Well, Queen had an album back in 1977 called News Of The World. That album contained a couple of very famous songs; one was We Are The Champions, and the other was We Will Rock You. Even if you don't know the songs names, I'm sure you've heard them before. It's the cover of this album that I really want to talk about though.

On the cover of that Queen album is a picture of a giant robot. That robot has the same face as the moon! I won't post the album cover, but here is a link to it. Go ahead and take a look, the similarity is amazing! But that's not all! There's more to this story that even more of you might appreciate!


What I'm about to tell you next may not be entirely accurate, but this is what I read. Supposedly, one of the people responsible for the movie Star Wars saw this same album cover, or at least they saw the source of the artwork, and it became the inspiration for another famous robot!

That famous robot was the droid named C-3P0. I'll give you another link so you can compare all three now.
Queen Robot
C-3P0

Cool huh?


Now a few more things. How did I get the pictures of the Moon? It didn't start out easily. I tried a few things which ended up the same as every other picture of the Moon I was able to get. The picture above is a fine example of that.

After getting over a dozen pictures like this one last night, I ran into the house and decided to search the internet to figure out this problem. Since I don't want to take the credit for solving this one alone, I'm going to show you what it was I found. Here is a link that gives you directions for how to take a picture of the Moon.

Now I have one final very interesting thing for you!



While I was in a nice dark place taking my first batch of photos, I saw this huge halo around the moon! You can see it decently in this last picture, even though the picture is bad. The ring was so huge that I couldn't capture the whole thing; it just wouldn't fit in one shot. This was the best I had.

This is the first time I have ever noticed anything like this, so I decided to do another internet search to see just what this was. Guess what! I have another link for you! Here is a web page with an interesting explanation about this and a few other things.

The Moon. What a wonderful thing we have up in our night sky.

(I want to add one unrelated thing here. I have been very distracted lately, so I haven't always been keeping up well on this blog or any of your blogs. This is because I have been spending most of my home time reading, what is to me, a very important book. I like to take my time while reading this. When I'm finished, I will be back here much more often.)

23 comments:

  1. Cool pictures. Come to think of it, this post reminds me of countless time I try to take a picture of the moon and fail. N nice touch on the Queen album

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  2. i love the moon even though she has a way of making people wacky when she is complete. great photos and info ratty. have a wonderful day...hugz!

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  3. Hi Ratty. This is a very interesting post today. I once saw the halo around the moon when I was living in Mexico- it really was amazing, it was the first and only time I have seen this. Also, I was shocked to see that the crescent moon in Mexico was like a smile- I was so surprised as here it is a vertical crescent shape. I loved the photos you took. The moon is great :)

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  4. The moon looks marvelous, Ratty, but why so mysterious about the book? :-) Spill it already!

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  5. I like the footnote. You are spending time on reading, and we maybe benefit from that.

    Thanks for the link, informative and interesting. I am wiser by a few inches.

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  6. happy reading Ratty! great moon shots!

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  7. Hello Ratty!
    It's been a while since I've commented. Computer issues. I love the moon shots. I did not know that about C-3PO! I LOVE StarWars so I shall tuck this little tid-bit of trivia away for a rainy day :)
    When we lived with my husband's parents out in the sticks, we would see a huge halo around the moon some nights. I've always wanted to capture it on film. Well done!

    Jen

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  8. Hi Ratty, fantastic pictures of the moon. They're far better than my attempts. Unfortunately my camera hasn't got a manual mode :-(

    I've seen a moon halo recently, I think it was on Monday night. I've never heard of moon dogs or the others, I'll have to watch out for them :-)

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  9. Spectacular shots Ratty and thanks for the how-to. I have never been able to capture good shots of the moon. Love the post.

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  10. I love trying to take pictures of the moon and yours is fantastic. i bookmarked that site so I can give it a try and see what results I get. Those two robots do look very similar

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  11. Great post ratty...I love the night sky and the moon so following your links and learning more about it was really interesting to me...i am always trying to get pictures of the moon..Ii look out my window and it looks fantastic but I can never seems to capture that in a photo. Not entirely sure your link will help me though...I'm way too much of a novice :-(

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  12. Oh wow! Congratulations!! Your photo is really good. You've inspired me now - I actually didn't realise it was possible to take photos like that of the moon with a normal camera.

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  13. Great moon landing! I used to be able to take night shots with my 35 mm, but I'm having trouble with the manual settings on the new digital. Congrats!

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  15. Really cool pics. I used to love to peer out at night and see a full moon. Things changed drastically when I started working as an emergency room nurse. Little piece of trivia. The word lunatic is derived from the word lunar=moon. It's really true that the tide, births and "crazy" behavior are worse or at least higher in frequency when the moon is full. I hate seeing a full moon...especially if I'm scheduled to work!

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  16. Hi Ratty!
    One must take breaks from blogging. It keeps you sane. :)

    And AWESOME on this moon post!!! I have not figured out on my own how to do the moon shots so thank you for the links!

    And we had that same huge halo last night and the night before. Twas spectacular moon light for three consecutive nights. I love the moon light. Great captures.

    ps. I think there is a bunny on the moon.

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  17. Congratz on your new technique Ratty :) Thats a good shot. The halo part are indeed hard to capture.

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  18. Excellent shots of the moon. I had forgotten about that Queen cover, one of my favorite bands as well but only with Freddy Mercury.

    Enjoy your reading, I have been distracted too lately but by the raking of leaves.

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  19. misterious moon,
    the moon that never set, haha, no place for life in the moon.

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  20. beautiful moon. i saw the moon when the sky is clean and no cloud

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  21. I am lucky with the camera I have...I put it on automatic focus, zoom in with my 18X point and shoot telescopic lens, and viola, I have a pretty decent picture of the moon!~ "-) but I sure would like to catch a moon bow like the article showed..that would be awesome.

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  22. @Kruel
    Now that I know how to do it Moon pictures are easy. I thought the Queen connection might be a strange bit of fun.
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    @PJ
    I love the Moon too, and partly because it makes people so wacky.
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    @Bemused
    I guess it makes sense that the angle changes the farther south we are. It's hard for someone like me in the northern hemisphere to imagine.
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    @Icy BC
    The book? That's easy. It's the new addition to Robert Jordan's Wheel Of Time Series, called The Gathering Storm. Maybe I'll have to give a mention in a post.
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    @Rainfield
    Yup, the book I'm reading can definitely help me to be more creative. It should give me a few more ideas.
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    @Cher
    Thanks for both!
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    @Jen
    I'm glad I could finally share that C-3P0 stuff with someone.
    I wish I could have captured the whole halo. My camera just couldn't zoom out far enough, and I didn't have my wide-angle lense with me.
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    @John
    I guess manual mode is what is important for getting these pictures. I wish it was easier.

    I've never seen a moon halo before this, and I've never seen the other stuff yet either.
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    @Poetic Shutterbug
    I hope moon shots will be easy for you now. I'm glad I finally decided to find out how to do it.
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    @Ann
    The photography site looks like an excellent place for lots of good tips and tricks.
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    @Allotments4you
    The link I gave you for the moon pictures is perfect for you. It's a blog with tips for novice photographers.
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    @Emm
    As long as you have a manual mode on your camera it will be easy.
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    @Sharkbytes
    You'll figure it out. The tips on that site I linked to are excellent, and they're for all of us who are new to digital photography.
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    @Ginnymo
    Thank you. I appreciate it.
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    @Roschelle
    I've heard this before from people who work at hospitals. I hope everyone else sees your comment too. Maybe people should all try to remember to stay calm when they see a full moon. :)
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    @Julia
    My breaks, and my sanity, seem to be failing me lately. Just kidding. I wish my camera would have enabled me to capture the whole halo, it was just so huge.

    Maybe there is a bunny. I'll bet that's what dug all of those holes. :D
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    @SquirrelQueen
    You're right, Queen without Freddie, who is maybe the best singer ever, is just not the same, but I'll take what I can get now.
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    @Bisnis
    Thanks!
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    @Free Recipes
    Who knows? Maybe one day we'll find a strange form of life even on the moon.
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    @Blackberry
    The moon is always beautiful.
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    @The Retired One
    Your camera is the kind I want. I also want to catch a moon bow. I'll have to make sure my wide angle lense is with me next time.

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