Moon lit scene with Txp 320

[Steven Ruttenberg]

I shot a scene at f/16 for 1.5 hours under a 3/4 moon. Took a guess. It was enough to fog film, but not much else. Looks like it would be a 4-6 hour exposure at least judging by failure of first attempt.

What is people's experience for a moonlit scene? Expo sure, etc?

[dasBlute]

The times I was doing a lot of night work, TMY2 seemed the best for LF, reciprocity-wise, fullmoon I was getting usable exposures in 10 minutes.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

Hmm. I might have to make some exposures of various times to figure out.

[dasBlute]

you could always go michael kenna style: trip the shutter, cover the camera with something dew protective, sleep until the alarm goes off [and before the sun comes up], and then close the shutter :)

[reddesert]

f/16 is going to make life difficult. Reciprocity failure means that faster f-stops are more efficient than longer exposures. I haven't taken a moonlit shot for a while but believe that I've had decent results with a small format lens at f/4 or so, ISO 400, and exposures well under an hour.

I googled up this calculator which seems plausible: http://sgphotos.com/blog/exptime.html Please note the author likely wrote this for digital and so it doesn't account for reciprocity failure. You also have to experiment for personal taste, since it's usually okay for a moonlit scene to appear pretty dark, not Zone V.

Something the calculator author did take into account, which matters, is that the moon surface is more reflective directly back at the viewer than at an angle. So full moon is significantly more than 2x brighter than half moon (1st or 3rd quarter).

A rule of thumb is that the full moon is 400,000 times less luminous than the sun. That is about 18.5 stops. Consider trying to reason from Sunny 16. To expose 400,000 times longer than Sunny 16 at ISO 400 = 1/400 sec, we have 1000 sec at f/16 (likely need to add a lot of reciprocity failure), or about 60 sec at f/4 (plus reciprocity failure, but less of it). That is for full moon, so partial moon would need longer time, but allowing the scene to go dark would allow a shorter time.

[Vaughn]

I have posted these before -- These figures are from Michael Kenna -- from a workshop 40? years ago.

Might be worth considering as a starting point.

[Mark Sampson]

Vaughn, the second part of those notes look like they were taken directly from the "Kodak Professional Photoguide" or their pocket version of same. The OP might do well to find a copy of one or the other of those publications (even if they're long out of print).

[Steven Ruttenberg]

I have a reciprocity table for most folks. All the ones I use. The main problem is even with moon at full brightness, the landscape will not register on the meter so one has to make an educated guess based on experience. In my case that is not an awful lot. My 1.5 hour exposure probably should have been 8 hours, but my wife was freezing her boobs off. Next time I am gonna go for 8 hours or whatever my testing says.

BTW, This was at Horseshoe Bend. It was a ghost town. Something positive from this virus.

[Tin Can]

Looking up the next 2 Full Moons at the Page location has just about 8 hours from last light to first light

I await the results!

[Corran]

T-Max 100 or Delta 100 will be "faster" than 400-speed film at a certain point, which you probably hit. Or if you've got some Acros, that's the "gold standard."
TXP would be about the worst film to go with on that, other than Foma films I guess.

[Pere Casals]

What is people's experience for a moonlit scene? Expo sure, etc?

If you cannot spotmeter well the night scene then we have a solution (modern times): use a DSLR and make several test shots (or your smartphone with special apps), when you have the right exposure for the DSLR you only have to apply LIRF correction.

Beware, each area in the scene may have different LIRF, shadows have more LIRF than highlights, for an ideal night metering you should meter diferent areas independently.

Ideally, from LIRF film calibration, you may be able to precisely predict density the "on negative" density you are to obtain for each spot.

Full moon lits from 0.05 to 0.3 Lux on your subjects, not much.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

I have used Tmax and have Acros (not experimenting with that though, saving it). Next time will try Tmax. And plan to spend all night there. Of course can't get back for a moon light scene till July. Partial shoulder replacement 16 June.

[Pere Casals]

Acros

Acros the right stuff for the night, regarding LIRF

Another approach is this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photographic_hypersensitization

I learned a lot with this book:

204447

[Jim Andrada]

Shoulder replacement mid June - probably unrealistic to think about July. Knees and shoulders are hard. I had a knee done - took a long time. One of the guys at PT had had his shoulder done and he seemed to be having it worse than me. Hips? Not so much. Good luck

[Jim Noel]

I shot a scene at f/16 for 1.5 hours under a 3/4 moon. Took a guess. It was enough to fog film, but not much else. Looks like it would be a 4-6 hour exposure at least judging by failure of first attempt.

What is people's experience for a moonlit scene? Expo sure, etc?

With such long exposures, T-Max 100 is stops faster than Tri-X because pf reciprocity.

[Jim Noel]

If you cannot spotmeter well the night scene then we have a solution (modern times): use a DSLR and make several test shots (or your smartphone with special apps), when you have the right exposure for the DSLR you only have to apply LIRF correction.

Beware, each area in the scene may have different LIRF, shadows have more LIRF than highlights, for an ideal night metering you should meter diferent areas independently.

Ideally, from LIRF film calibration, you may be able to precisely predict density the "on negative" density you are to obtain for each spot.

Full moon lits from 0.05 to 0.3 Lux on your subjects, not much.

Another answer which doesn't require a digital "camera". Meter important highlights and place on Zone VII or VIII. Let the shadows fall where they may. The result wil look like a night shot.

[Pere Casals]

Another answer which doesn't require a digital "camera". Meter important highlights and place on Zone VII or VIII. Let the shadows fall where they may. The result wil look like a night shot.

Yes... I agree. This is a very good recipe.

Anyway if we want some shadows recorded then we have to refine our metering-processing, because when recording those shadows we may blow highlights.

[tonyowen]

How about the lunar 11 or looney11 rule which states:-

Let us start with the basics. The moon is very bright in relation to the rest of the night landscape. How many times have you tried to photograph the moon only to find that the result is a bright white blob in the sky. If our only concern is to capture the detail in the surface of the moon there is a simple rule to follow to achieve the correct exposure. The rule, called the “lunar 11” or sometimes “looney 11” rule, is a formula to obtain the correct exposure and capture the detail in the moon’s surface. Start with your camera in the “manual” mode and make the following settings:
•Aperture (f/stop) – f/11
•ISO – 100
•Shutter speed 1/100th second

Under ideal conditions these setting will get you very close to the correct exposure. Adjustments may need to be made to compensate for atmospheric conditions, phase of the moon and light pollution. If the moon appears too bright increase the shutter speed or conversely if the moon appears too dark use a longer shutter speed or open the aperture. If you use a longer shutter speed, be aware that the moon and earth are moving. For a telephoto lens never use a shutter speed slower than 1/30sec. or the moon will be blurred by the movement.

regards
Tony

[Corran]

That rule is for taking photos of the bright disk of the moon, not the landscape under moonlight. That exposure will result in a blank negative shooting a landscape illuminated by the moon.

[tuco]

From my M9, 25mm, f4, ISO 400, 32 sec under a harvest moon. And that equals the general Full Moon Rule for Acros at f8 for 8 min.

https://live.staticflickr.com/4509/38114215816_7075976fed_b.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2152ju1)
Harvest Moon (https://flic.kr/p/2152ju1) by tuco (https://www.flickr.com/photos/yo_tuco/), on Flickr

[tonyowen]

That rule is for taking photos of the bright disk of the moon, not the landscape under moonlight.

Agreed Corran, but the OP is asking for ideas etc. Post #5 mentions the Sunny 16 rule, so the Looney 11 rule is merely another limiter.

Regards

Tony