Idnas71

I just realized there is a full moon scheduled for the day I plan to visit Monument Valley in June. Has anyone (amateurs) had experience of capturing a full moon in their Monument Valley photos? Thanks for any stories or advice.

Sandi

dwooddon

Like any photography problem with huge variations in lighting and exposure, if you have to ask, it may be more luck than anything else to get a really good shot (me too). Photography courses spend weeks and weeks covering just this problem and then, it still takes lots of practice to consistently expose correctly.

If you are shooting digital or slides, in addition to bracketing the hell out of my shots, I would try to get a really great photo of the full moon, a separate really great photo of the landscape around twilight, then use good editing software to merge them. It will be much easier to get good exposures of them separately than together.

Photodog

Checking the moon rise/set times for June 16 on the Old Farmers Almanac, the moon rise time is 4:52am and sets at 8:10pm. By that time you may have some light on the monuments. Web site www.almanac.com/rise/index.php
A couple of things to keep in mind. If you are shooting a landscape the moon will probably be so small not to matter. If you want the moon larger do like dwooddon mentioned, shoot the moon separately, use a long focal length lens, not so large as to make the moon look fake in the finished image. Be sure to position the moon in the frame keeping in mind where you are going to have the landscape be or else you may have a moon coming out of a monument. The other way to do it is on a single piece of film if you camera allows you to double expose. In either case would suggest you shoot the landscape portion with a split neutral density filter, darkening the sky to get the tonal range of sky and landscape closer to one another. This is especially true with slide or digital.

bob_brown

I think you should have fast film, a tripod, and a cable release.
Without a tripod and a cable release, you most likely will get a blurry picture.

The light may be bright enough to register on a light meter, so you can get a good reading. I know at Yellowstone, it was very bright.

as suggested, try about 5 exposures at various timings.

My camera has a B setting which means I click it open, count, and click it shut.
I did 3 shots of sunset at Glacier one year and all of them came out.

ASA 200 Fuji film has a wide latitude on the bright side. I often shoot it at 100 ASA to make sure the dark areas sshow up. I assume 400 ASA would have equal latitude.

Digital cameras also have a wide latitude and if the picture is no good, it is not very costly to erase it.

But I think a tripod is mandatory and a cable release is too, unless you have a light touch.

I carry a little tripod with me and it works quite well. Just don't try using it with a 300 mm zoom lens; too heavy probably.

Idnas71

Thanks a lot, everyone, for the advice. I'm printing it out to read a little closer but having skimmed over the comments I can tell this is already way over my head. I've only got a Pentax point-n-shoot 35mm camera and I'll have to read my manual to see what options I can incorporate. But I have gotten some lucky night shots with it before so I'll just give it a try anyway. Thanks again.

Idnas71

Forgot to mention... I was looking at a moon phase website yesterday and it mentioned June 2nd for a full moon this year. Maybe I was looking at it wrong. June 16th will see me back at home alerady so this may be a totally pointless question afterall.

utahtea

IMHO a moonless night at Monument Valley is the best. Make sure you are away from lights and go out after dark & see the stars. You can see the milkyway!

Utahtea

bob_brown

If it is a point and shoot, aka point and pray, get the fastest film you can find. Then cross your fingers and bang away. The ones I have seen have no shutter or lens opening control,
So there is nothing you can do but control the film speed and when you press the shutter.

That little flash attachment is not going to be of much use out of doors!
Given that the effective range of those little things is about 20 - 24 feet.

Photodog

Sorry wasn't looking at full moon times on my original post. If you can do timed exposures (B or T on your shutter speed dial) try leaving the lens open for 15-30 minutes or longer (need cable release and tripod to do this)before the moon rises at 8:36pm. Leave your lens at the widest aperture. This will give you star trails above the monuments. Don't go for long exposures with the moon included otherwise will get a white streak where the moon is due to earth's rotation