Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Image:Total lunar eclipse august 28 2007.jpg

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[edit] Total Lunar Eclipse Sequence

A sequence of images from the 28 August 2007 lunar eclipse
A sequence of images from the 28 August 2007 lunar eclipse
Edit 1 by Fir0002; removed stars, slight levels on blacks, added more time bars
Edit 1 by Fir0002; removed stars, slight levels on blacks, added more time bars

First the McNaught and now this - it's been a pretty good year in the southern skies! aside from the lack of rain... But anyway, I know that this was a well photographed event, but I think this shot is probably one of the best enc wise. Each image was taken at about 3 minute intervals except the last image in the sequence which shows what the moon looked like at about the middle of the eclipse. I've included time markers to give you an idea of when each shot was taken - but these obviously can be removed if people don't like them. One of the most surprising things (at least for me) was just how linear the ascent of the moon was. I was expecting a somewhat parabolic path. Clouds obscured the moon during the egress so I didn't bother shooting a sequence of that.
As an added bonus I've even been super generous with the pixel count :)

Appears in Lunar eclipse and 28 August 2007 lunar eclipse

  • Support Self Nom. --Fir0002 05:09, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support Well done. It might be worth considering adding more time labels, and it would also be nice to have one from about 6:50 for the sake of symmetry. Otherwise I'd say its outstanding. Cacophony 06:10, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Yeah it would have been good - but unfortunately I wasn't quite prepared enough and the shots I took earlier were over exposed. I suppose I could photograph the moon tonight if the clouds clear up. --Fir0002 23:26, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support Lovely work, those kind of things require a great deal of patience, and for rare event you only really have once chance to get it right. I agree that more time labels would be nice though to give it more context. WikipedianProlific(Talk) 11:04, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support Very nice, although the pixel count is almost too large, given each moon is only about 100px each. (But there's at least 10 moons, so that's ≥100px of subject, right?) I would also support more annotation and a full moon at the bottom. The thing that strikes me the most is why the moons form a diagonal line. Did it move across the sky like that? I think it would be more useful in an article to a vertical line of moons, with the total eclipse on the bottom. That way it can be put on the right side of an article and sort of fall through the sections, like the Signpost banner. That's just one idea, though. Great image nonetheless.--HereToHelp 12:17, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
Yeah that's the path the moon took across the sky. I mean I could do as you suggest and just make a straight vertical - but I feel that the enc value of this image would be far better.
  • conditional strong support - answer me these questions three: 1) What does the dashed line signify? A longer time gap? I'm not sure it's necessary. 2) If you want to keep the dashed line, it looks a little off center, like it doesn't point exactly to the center of the earlier moon. 3) Which image was used for the background? presumably the stars would make linear sequence also, except they appear only once. I'd consider removing them all or explaining which moon image contains them. I like the fadey pointer lines btw. Debivort 15:13, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • OK, 1) yeah it just shows the longer time gap 2) i think it's probably worth keeping - I drew a straight line from the centre of both moons and aligned it to that so it should be good now 3)I made it as Fbc guessed below - with the camera on a tripod I shot photos until it went out of frame and then moved the position until I got all the photos. And then in Photoshop I got the first image of the sequence at the bottom and stacked the rest on top in "lighten" mode (only lighter pixels come through) and then I merged the four resulting sequences into a big long one with just a black background. Hope this helps! and yes I like the fadey pointer lines too :) --Fir0002 23:26, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Great! Too bad it can't be on the main page 6 days ago. Debivort 00:49, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment So, this looks like, what, 4 sky segments stitched together to form the path of the moon? The differences in ambient light, average exposure, etc. make these different segments pretty obvious (on my LCD monitor). I wounder if it wouldn't be better to just cut out each moon, and arange them in a line. As it is now the black BG and the semi-black sky clash a bit too much. -Fcb981(talk:contribs) 17:01, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Ah ha, I decided to recalibrate my monitor after trying to do some photo work and getting bad results and when I checked back here... guess what, black as night. -Fcb981(talk:contribs) 21:03, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Yeah it will make a difference on a properly calibrated monitor! I don't think it's be a good idea to just cut them out - compiling them as I described above gives a really scientific image with correct trajectory! I've uploaded an edit where I've brought up the levels of the blacks 4 points which removes most of the visible bordering. I've also removed the stars (believe it or not at the exposure I was using they were only visible once the moon went red) - keeping them looks messy (it's just a heap of dots). I've also added more time pointers. --Fir0002 23:26, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support edit Looks good. : ) -Fcb981(talk:contribs) 00:07, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support. I like it, and was impressed. But two comments, echoing others. I might like to see more time stamps (but am unsure until I see how they look). Also, I am disappointed in the greater gap between the final image and the preceding image. Was someone sleeping on the job? Unschool 01:11, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support edit I prefer the star-less version and I prefer the extra time stamps. As others have touched on, I would also prefer a continuous sequence up to totality, even if it makes the image significantly larger. Matt Deres 14:26, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support edit per above --Childzy ¤ Talk 22:27, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support Edit 1. I was going to nominate this myself. NauticaShades 22:41, 3 September 2007 (UTC)


  • Support Wonderful image. I think time labels would draw attention away from the image itselfGhelelio 14:18, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Conditional support edit 1 The timestamps are messed up : 7:54 PM, 7:12 PM, 7:30 PM, 7:18PM. I prefer the edit for the better contrast. Anyway, great pic, congratulations to the author.Ksempac 20:26, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support edit. If you have the information, may I suggest adding more precise time information (seconds, if your camera's internal clock is sufficiently accurate), and adding to the caption the precise GPS coordinates of the location of your camera? Who knows-- this information might be of some scientific benefit for people who want to compare your pictures to those taken by other observers at other locations. Spikebrennan 13:50, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Support edit1 - great picture. -- Chris B • talk • contribs 19:49, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Promoted Image:Total lunar eclipse august 28 2007 edit.jpg MER-C 02:57, 9 September 2007 (UTC)