Photographing Blood Moon

 

Why is Blood Moon Called Blood Moon: Some Theories and pictures of Blood Moon

 

So the regulars  here on desi Traveler, your friendly neighborhood family travel blog, will know that I am a little filmy in nature, a true Bollywood aficionado, ( did you notice I used such a big word aficionado )breaking into song and dance sequence and crooning, “ Chand Tare Tod laoon” ( Let me break and bring Moon and Stars etc.), or
Chodween kaa chand ho ya, ( meaning you are moon on the 14th … ) and other similar songs celebrating moon. Moon, oh yes moon, that reminds me this post is about Blood moon and not about Bollywood etc. And I am a very scientific type of person so every time we have a special moon day I am on rooftop to click pictures of the special moon.
So before we move forward please have a look at my post about
        Karwa Chauth Moon
        Once in a Blue Moon

Since to watch these special moons I need to travel to the 7th heaven floor roof, it is safe to conclude a post about Moon is appropriate for a travel blog. Right ? Right 🙂 

After all moon has such a significant role in our lives from being Chanda Mama (Moon Uncle) in our childhood to the promise you never intend to keep to your beloved moon always comes into picture. So when I read about the Blood Moon, I was on the 7th heaven floor roof ready with my camera, tripod and other gear to click the Blood Moon.
A bit of Googled Gyan here would not be out-of-place about Blood Moon: During Lunar Eclipse when Earth’s shadow falls on moon, the best known natural satellite of mother earth. During this phenomenon the moon appears a little orange / brownish etc. which the poetic types or believers in Dracula types call Blood Moon.
Though I have a different theory about why the blood moon is called Blood Moon: You see when I was on rooftop to click the moon there were about 268987 ( give or take 2689, just a guess I did not count  )  mosquitoes also on the roof, who due to their total disregard for my pursuit for higher things in life had only one single pointed needle agenda and it was to suck my blood. So while I was struggling between auto focus and manual focus they were focusing on my blood and sucking it collectively and singing songs in praise of Count Dracula, hence the name Blood Moon. Believe it or not, your choice.
So let us get back to the 7th heaven floor roof. It was a cloudy evening and some of the kids from our society along with their moms were also on the roof. But the moon like the Chief Guest of a desi event was nowhere to be seen. Soon the Missus, the kids and the other ladies from the society were busy chatting and the Moon Spotting team got converted into take care of the kids on rooftop team for the kids found the open terrace a great place to run around. In a crowded city a terrace is best suited to click Blood Moon Pictures

I had almost lost hope of spotting the moon, when the suddenly behind one of the ugly under construction towers a very pale Mr. Moon appeared, rather than blood moon glowing with radiant hemoglobin we had an anorexic, partial moon in the sky. Now the kids were wondering where the rest of the moon vanished, so I gave them the same googled gyan that I gave to you guys a few paragraphs above. Remember 7th grade Science – Sun- Earth – Shadow – Moon no light = Lunar Eclipse etc.
Then I got clicking. Now let me share how the Blood moon pictures were clicked.
The most important accessory in this pursuit to click pictures of Blood Moon were:
1. My Sturdy Manfrotto Tripod
2. Remote Camera Trigger
3. Nikon D 7000 Camera
4. 55-300 mm VR Nikon Zoom Lens.

How I clicked pictures of Blood Moon: I started the first picture with F/18 with an exposure time of 3 seconds as the moon was really pale and really tough to capture with all the lights from the under construction tower making getting good shots tough. But the challenge with 3 second exposure even on tripod is that moon is constantly moving. Yes we can not notice it but it is constantly moving in space so the pictures tend to be a bit blurry. Later I experimented with different shutter speeds and ISO etc. and the best results that I got was with F/5.6, ISO 800 and a shutter speed of 1/6 seconds. To be honest even that gave a bit blurry pictures but only when you zoom them a lot, for naked eyes they seem to be OK.

The Blood Moon was in a hurry to complete the eclipse phase and soon higher in sky and with each passing second as the shadow became shorter the moon became a bit brighter but at no time it was of the real blood-red color, unless I am color blind and am not aware of it. But since I passed my driving license test with flying colors ( and a bit of hand of god ) I think it will be safe to assume I am not color blind and Blood moon is actually orange  in color, at-least the one I saw.
So did you see blood moon? What Color was it? By the way if you are wondering then the next Blood Moon due to total lunar eclipse in India  will be on July 27, 2018.

Linking to SKYWATCH  a weekly gathering of sky lovers and sky watchers. Join us

If you have liked reading the post please feel free to subscribe by email and like it or share it with your friends on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, twitter and Google+ .

I promise that I will not sell, rent, or donate your email to anybody

🙂 🙂 🙂