Dittyday 5: Chris de Burgh

Al Denelsbeck

Yes, we’re still wallowing in the eighties music, and I say that up front so you can heap scorn and go back to listening to, I don’t know, some misspelled artist of some kind. There was a particular quality to music from the eighties, and I’m fully aware that I may be saying that because that’s when I first got seriously interested in music. It’s also the time when I started hearing music from much better sources than the local radio stations, and when I had a decent stereo system, which certainly introduced more nuances and subtleties that simply did not come through a single 8-ohm speaker on a clock radio, so yeah, there are mitigating factors. But there remain some aspects that I’ll highlight yet again here.

Our artist this fine Tuesday is Chris de Burgh, who most people are at least a little familiar with, even if they only know one song; in the US at least, there were but two that made it into regular rotation – a little too regular, according to some. We’re about to get to one of those before we move on to some unknowns from perhaps his strongest album.

“The Lady in Red” is certainly the single that charted the highest and received the most airplay, and I was under the impression that it made it onto a soundtrack of some movie from that period, but I find no mention of it so I’m probably conflating it with the obscure movie of the same name. As popular as it was, it also received some scathing criticism, a small portion of which (in my opinion) is deserved, since it’s a slow love ballad. One critic in particular called it “mawkish,” but then again, all slow love ballads can be called that if you’re so inclined, and I learned long ago that many music critics are even more sexually frustrated than televangelists, and just as mistakenly enamored of their own pronouncements; feel free to apply that to me as well if you like. I still find that “The Lady in Red” showcases de Burgh’s remarkable vocal range quite well, and establishes the mood that he was after. Depth or ‘meaning?’ Not so much; again, love ballad. It still compares favorably against countless other examples, before and since, and the sales figures have their own say. This may have led to it being relentlessly overplayed on many stations, which is enough to breed fierce resentment, but that’s the fault of program directors, not the musician or band.

But his first big hit was entirely different, and not even close to a love song, or indeed a whole lot else to be found, and certainly has all the energy lacking from any ballad. We’re no longer in the realm of ‘present day’ here, while being vague about what realm we are within – that’s up to the listener’s interpretation. Really, there should be more songs of this nature, because they induce a lot more attention to the lyrics – granted, I was into role-playing games at the time and so the legend/mythos aspect might have resonated more. Here’s the second recognizable offering from Chris de Burgh, “Don’t Pay the Ferryman,” and while the mood and energy are far from subtle, pay attention to the bassline and the synth accents that help establish much of the feel of the song.

Don’t Pay the Ferryman – Chris de Burgh

Should you have attempted to sing along, you’re either hurting right now, or cravenly skipped the choruses, or possess a significant vocal range, far in excess of ninety percent of recording artists in any time period, something for which de Burgh receives too little recognition. While most people seem to associate the eighties with synth and ‘New Wave,’ one of the biggest things emphasized then was vocalization, clear and melodic. How this morphed into semi-spoken and often mumbled lyrics throughout the nineties remains a mystery to me, possibly evidence of an interdimensional rift, but I’m betting most of those artists/bands will see no resurgence in popularity like the eighties did.

Not too long after “Don’t Pay the Ferryman” charted, de Burgh released the album Into the Light, which featured “The Lady in Red” and the following three songs. You’ve been forewarned: the next one is another love ballad, but as far as I’m concerned, it should have taken the place of “The Lady in Red” on the charts, because it’s much stronger and more dynamic musically, and even if the lyrics aren’t particularly deep, they nonetheless carry more of the story. And again, the vocalizing is excellent, though remaining within reach of more people this time. The saxophone was the only brass that seemed to make it out of the seventies for a while, largely vanishing by the nineties (in favor of the folk guitar – trite trite trite trite trite,) and it’s used to good effect here, establishing the mood as much as, if not more than, the lyrics. This is, “Fatal Hesitation.”

Fatal Hesitation – Chris de Burgh

For the next song, we see how de Burgh is adept at creating a brooding quality to his music, but it often exists as an undertone to very powerful crashes and flourishes, an undeniable amount of energy while still carrying a faintly forbidding air. No love song now – you can almost feel the stiff breeze coming off the ocean ahead of the storm, with the flashes of lightning, even as the celebrations take place. There’s triumph, but there remain indications of what it took to get there. This one deserves a lot of attention to the music, because it exemplifies a trait of the eighties, the ability to blend together a widely disparate collection of riffs and stings, commentary from countless instruments, eschewing the overused reliance on electric guitar and the extended solo (even though de Burgh is most recognized as a guitarist.) This time it’s the drums that provide a surprising amount of the music while not really being a drum song; meanwhile, the basic synth sound sticks with just a few notes in the background, though various other keyboard parts have their say. It’s a refined recipe rather than a potluck, though you’d be hard-pressed to establish what the ‘melody’ is. This is, “Last Night.”

Last Night – Chris de Burgh

I wasn’t originally going to include the next song, but realized that it should be in the collection. First off, it confirms that de Burgh has an interest in history, especially of the wars (this is not firsthand – he’s not that old,) which is further departure from love songs. But this one is much like a modern interpretation of folk songs or ballads of yore, in that it’s the lyrics that establish almost the entire melody, and it’s not hard to imagine them slightly differently as some Renn Faire version. Towards the end we get some dueling electric guitars, a little mainstream but necessary when there are no lyrics to fill in. Again, de Burgh can kick it vocally, which is a significant portion of why he’s being featured here, though his compositional skills should not be ignored. This is, “Say Goodbye to It All.”

Say Goodbye to It All – Chris de Burgh

If I recall correctly, I did actually get his followup album, Flying Colors, back close to when it first came out, but was never as struck by the songs as I was with Into the Light. I am slightly ashamed to say that I’ve done little research into later efforts, which will be corrected – I avoided it for this post, because it took long enough as it was, plus I had plenty to feature already, but there may well be a sequel to it if I find some nice little gems in there. This time around, I wanted to show that the guy that did that one song you knew of also did some much more remarkable stuff, so hopefully I accomplished that, but hey, I can accept that tastes differ. Even when they’re completely corrupt.

It’s there, I tells ya!

Al Denelsbeck

Doing my check with the ol’ Stellarium, I found that I would have another opportunity for a particular accomplishment this morning right before sunrise, so I set the alarm and made off while skies were still dark (well, as dark as they get around here, which doesn’t count as significantly dark at all,) to be on site when it happened.

“What’s that?” you ask in that long-suffering way, rolling your eyes and wondering if I can get to the point within another paragraph, or whether I’m going to keep padding out a post like a goddamn high-school essay, and you should know better by now, because I enjoy the little clicks that the keyboard keys make, so no, we’re going into another paragraph after all, even if it is only the next sentence.

The crescent moonrise, I say with some surprise, wondering why you’re not aware of this. It’s not like it’s hard to keep track of. This morning, the moon would rise only a short period before the sun, and in that time, it would be a remarkably thin crescent – 0.9% illuminated, actually. That would be the smallest that I’ve captured, if I was successful. So was I successful?

No.

pre-sunrise sky showing no hint of crescent moon at all
Timing is right, direction is right, so the ultra thin moon is in there somewhere, but as you can see from the conditions, humidity and the thin clouds on the horizon (actually, throughout most of the sky) were conspiring to keep it from me – and everyone else in the region, too, though shockingly, I was the only one sitting there on the side of the interstate looking out over the lake at the time, so I guess something important was going on elsewhere. The reason I was out on the interstate by the lake (Falls Lake this time,) was that I needed a view as low as possible, shielded by as few trees as I could manage, and this particular spot offered 3.5 kilometers (I know – I checked) before something rising above the water would block the view, so, pretty low. About the best I’m going to get without a mountaintop or an ocean, really, and they’re both 200 kilometers or more away.

[A brief note here: I was using my smutphone for orientation, instead of a proper mapping compass, and I’m going to stop doing that. My previous cheapass little ZTE phone wasn’t too bad at orientation, but my now still-cheapass Samsung sucks remarkably at it. Holding perfectly still, you can watch the directions change by as much as eight degrees or so, which is no help at all when you have to be precise with high magnification. People enthuse about how much their smutphones can do, but if it can only do any of them halfass, why bother?]

Even if it had been perfectly clear, I doubt I would have seen anything, between how bright the sky was getting and the seeing conditions, which are illustrated by this cropped detail of a cellphone tower beyond the lake’s edge.

atmospheric distortion on distant cell tower
I even did a brief video clip, which I’m not going to bother putting up here (it’s but a few seconds long,) that shows the rippling of a plane contrail that I could even see in the viewfinder. This was likely from residual heat rising from the lake after the air cooled at night, meaning the lake wasn’t the ideal spot for this, or at least not when the temperature drops.

Despite the lack of moon, the sky was becoming pretty photogenic – there were some nice deep pinks and reds developing closer to where the sun would break the horizon, and I figured I could get something out of the efforts.

A flock of seagulls, the not-famous kind, against the predawn red sky
My location was far from ideal, however: cell and high-tension towers, power lines, and just plain ol’ trees were getting into every vantage (all you people insisting on your 5G coverage to stream shitass movies on your phones have really screwed things up for nature photographers – you know that, right?) But not far away, almost within sight, was a boat ramp with a much better vantage, in fact the one that I used for my first Leonids attempt this year. Getting to it, however, was another matter, given my position alongside a very-busy interstate. I had to go up to the next exit, turn around, head back down past where I’d been to another exit, and then down a couple of klicks to the ramp entrance, all because the car had wheels and not hoverjets or something useful like that (in 2021!) Naturally, by the time I did all this, the brilliant reddish tones had all vanished from the sky, leaving mostly yellow. I’ll keep saying it: be on site before sunrise/set if that’s what you’re after, because seeing the colors and then deciding to find a good spot to use them will usually be too late – they change very rapidly. This isn’t a case of, “Not as I do,” because I was on site – just not with the intention of sunrise itself. So there.

streaky predawn sky with flocks of birds over lake
The colors really weren’t bad, they just weren’t as good as they’d been 20 minutes earlier, but I still snagged a few frames. and yes, that’s the same cell tower down there, only from a slightly different angle and at 18mm full-frame instead of 600 and cropped. With the rising light, the birds were getting active, and flocks of them were visible in all directions – mostly seagulls and cormorants it appeared, none of them venturing very close, and the one heron that I heard stayed right at the shadow line above the water, indistinct, and never came out to make a focal point.

no-longer-floating dock on Falls Lake, NC
I didn’t spot any eagles, either, and while I’ve been seeing them routinely on Jordan Lake, not that far away, I can’t imagine they’d avoid this one, so I’m only putting it down to luck this time. The patches of blue made nice enough accents, but you can see the lake level is significantly down, since that’s supposed to be a floating dock – I wouldn’t recommend jumping off the end of that unless you’re an Atlantic City high-dive actor that can handle only half-a-meter of water at best. I also wouldn’t recommend it due to the temperature, but some people are into that kind of thing.

Anyway, not through lack of trying, but still in search of better photo subjects. Or nonsense – I’m not averse to posting nonsense.

Profiles of Nature 48

Al Denelsbeck

As we close in towards the end of the year, now is probably not a good time to tell you we’re having so much fun, we may continue the Profiles indefinitely, i.e., endlessly. Eternally. In fact, we’re thinking of having kids just to carry on the legacy – why should rich assholes be the only ones that get to do this? Hell, we’re already choosing names…

juvenile green treefrog Hyla cinerea Gefjun suggesting you talk to the hand
This week we try to meet Gefjun, who’s signalling her handlers to get this vermin out of her face; she’s too big a star to bother with the little people. Soon after, she began screaming at her publicist for allowing the interview in the first place, amid protests that she badly needed some positive spin. As such, we can’t tell you much about her, except for what crew and bystanders were willing to vouchsafe – which was a lot! Gefjun grew up a fiercely bigoted racist shit, but identifies as tolerant and open-minded; it may sound like we’re making some tired old joke here, but we all know someone exactly like that, don’t we? Okay then. Gefjun did the whole privileged, pulled-strings thing growing up, from child beauty pageants (goddamn, they’re creepy) to cruising through an ivy-league college despite not knowing how to pronounce, “nuclear.” Her parents were steering her towards politics (go on – guess which ticket?) but she opted to go into show business instead because she wouldn’t have to look appealing to the working classes every four years. Unfortunately this isn’t turning out so well, since being a “400 milligram treefrog” on the set doesn’t translate usefully, her own fault for never having learned metric. Plus the fact that, due to shunning interviews, nobody knows how to pronounce, “Gefjun” and they’ll usually cast someone else just to avoid embarrassment. We can’t imagine. She likes demanding points even though she has no idea what they are, but it sounds ‘industry.’ Gefjun’s plans for retirement are to not piss off her rich parents, and her favorite on-set tirade is over being given a thick highlighter when she wanted a thin one, never realizing that markers can be rotated.

The reserve has not yet been met [cheapskates,] so next week goes on as planned.

On this date 59

Al Denelsbeck

Boy, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? But I noticed that I haven’t posted anything for December 1st in the past three years, and decided to rectify that. This was a good choice, because I’ve shot quite a few photos on December 1st, though mostly in two specific years, so I have plenty to work with.

We’ll start with 2008.

conjunction of crescent moon, Jupiter, and Venus from 12/01/08
same frame drastically overbrightened to show treelineA variation of this was posted last year in connection with the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn that took place, but this is instead Jupiter and Venus (and the moon, of course.) The dimmer points of light toward the bottom of the frame are not stars, or even above the horizon, but someone’s porch lights shining through the trees instead. I only shot a few frames playing with exposure, knowing that I was about to lose Jupiter in the trees, and in fact, I blew the exposure out on a version, just now, to show how close that was, seen to the right. You can also make out the scattered high-altitude clouds that make the barest appearance alongside the moon above in the ‘proper’ exposure. But I did at least catch the earthshine on the moon, and the planets distinctly enough, though nowadays I know I would do much better. That’s kind of the whole point, isn’t it? I’d hate to think I was backsliding as I got older.

On to 2012.

red-shouldered hawk Buteo lineatus perched in bare tree
At the old place, we had a handful of red-shouldered hawks (Buteo lineatus) hanging around pretty much all year long, and while I saw mating activity, I never spotted either a nest or newly-fledged young. This one is showing that it’s indeed a cold morning by being fluffed out noticeably as it watches for tasty movement below.

On the same day, I was doing detail shots of a ‘stain’ on the kitchen window.

egg cluster of unidentified lacewing Hemerobiidae
Seen at very high magnification, an unidentified lacewing (Hemerobiidae) had placed a large cluster of eggs on the window, which I only noticed because it seemed too uniform. Surprisingly, they’d hatched a month or so later, so there are further details and a scale shot here, but I purposefully cropped tight for the abstract nature on today’s frame.

Now we visit 2014.

very tight crop of dead leaf veins
This is a very tight crop of the original frame, again for the abstract nature of it, and I feel obligated to point out that it’s in situ, laying curled on the ground here and not in any kind of holding rig or a ‘studio’ shot or anything – I was sprawled on the forest floor, having spotted the light shining through and decided to get fartsy. These spells come over me from time to time, but they pass quickly.

And from the same outing:

dead twigs poking from water with reflection and long-jawed orb weavers Tetragnatha
Still fartsy and abstract, so the spell hadn’t passed yet – I actually like both the reflections of the twigs kind of confusing things in there, and the faint indications of them continuing below the surface. And the spiders, of course, which are probably some variety of long-jawed orb weavers (Tetragnatha.) I know, we just did the end of the month abstract, so what am I doing putting up even more? Well, it’s what I got on this date, which is the slow season, so more conducive to such things in the first place. Don’t worry – I’m not starting to do beginning of the month abstracts as a routine now.

I don’t think…

Just because, part 44

Al Denelsbeck

Still a bit slow here, still involved in non-photography things, so one last one for November, because it’s here.

small runabout buried in reeds and overgrowth
This one’s been in the blog folder for ages, originally brought in for purposes now forgotten and obviously never used then. It dates back from 2003 or 2004, from Florida, a little discovery when exploring off of a short path to a fishing dock. I always found it a bit poignant, almost evoking the old WWII bomber found in the jungle somewhere; where did this come from? What’s the story behind it?

Though unlike a WWII bomber, this likely has nothing of interest in its background. Sitting on the edge of the Indian River Lagoon, which is the sound between the mainland and the Atlantic barrier islands in the central coastal area, the most probable reason for its presence is simply a tropical storm or hurricane, pulling it free from its moorings and carrying it away an unknown distance. For boat owners, there’s not a lot you can do in such a case, and combing the overgrowth at the edges of the ‘river’ for kilometers on either side stands a good chance of being completely in vain since many of the boats that go missing in storms simply sink. Its loss was probably an insurance settlement, and that was that. I’ve seen several such examples, but this one just had an air about it, almost hidden from sight and with the overhanging palm leaves, a little dramatic reveal within one of those many crime scene television shows. The various bulletholes were, I’m sure, entirely coincidental…

November, git!

Al Denelsbeck

As we look out the back window and find November once again getting into the trash, we send it on its way with a shout and a well-aimed pine cone. Yes, it’s the end of the month, and time for our abstract. Would you like to hazard a guess as to what it will be?

Never mind, nobody likes guessing games. It’s this:

backlit overlapping Japanese maple leaves
The original framing was wider than this, but as I saw the eye-bending portion of it, I knew it was the month-end image. Not to mention how few I’ve actually taken this month – not closing in too fast on that new record. But it is from this month, and better than some entries at that, so there.

This is of course one of the Japanese maple trees, presently hiding out in the greenhouse until spring, but captured during its elaborate autumnal display. The focus depth was short, so the one leaf has the sharp edges while mostly shadowed by the others. It works for me.

And boy, have I been stalling on my posts – this is being written only a half hour before it’s due, if I keep to my typical scheduling anyway. However, I can’t feel that I haven’t been getting things done; they’re just not reflected here at all.

Shouldn’t be once a year at least

Al Denelsbeck

Today’s holiday should not only occur much more often, it would have helped tremendously if it had at least popped up a day earlier. Today is Never Assume That Someone Else Did It Correctly Day, the day when we carefully consider projects, repairs, upgrades, and the like from the standpoint that maybe the person before you was a nitwit. Since I’m in the middle of home projects right now (a small part of this balanced breakfast why I’m not posting much,) as I said, this would have come in handier yesterday while I was wiring up a new switch, and saved me a bit of headache checking connections when things didn’t work, but I suppose it’s my fault for starting such a thing before the actual holiday.

Of course, it’s probably better to assume every project day is this holiday – I know I’ve both been bitten (by failing to search for the spoor of the addlebrained handyman,) and saved a lot of trouble by double-checking the details first. I could have checked the polarity of the incoming wires with a multi-tester before replacing the switch, but I tend to kill the power before even opening a cover plate, to avoid accidents. This is largely due to, as an adolescent, being around my dad when he decided to wire a light switch without turning off the breaker; “It’s okay as long as you’re careful,” a phrase akin to, “Are you filming this?” right before an xtremekooldood stunt. A minute or so after uttering this dismissal, I heard a sharp crack! and something skittered across the floor past my feet. I jerked around to see my dad examining the tip of the screwdriver, which was considerably shorter and no longer able to drive screws; the thing that had danced past me was a portion of the tip, blown off by a 120v20a current when he inadvertently shorted the screwdriver across the terminals. I immediately went down and shut off the breaker.

Another little tip for the DIYer: If you’re tempted to change something from standard practices or rules, don’t. But if you have to, mark things clearly in the assumption that the next person working on this will not be you (or even, that you may have forgotten doing this by that time.)

The various projects taking up my time have been a broad spectrum of experiences, ranging from, “That was a lot easier than expected,” to, [Sigh] “Okay, I’m running down to the hardware store again, be back shortly.” I’m not going to mention injuries, because so far there have been nothing but trivial ones, and I don’t want to jinx things – yes, I’m into critical thinking, and yes, I still think posting any gloating is just asking for trouble. So I’m keeping mum. And photographically, not a damn thing has been happening – it’s been cold, and the autumn colors have largely gone away, so I’m not motivated to even try. Once past a couple of tasks here, I’ll dig up something of interest (to me at least – not necessarily to anyone else, if the visitation stats are the slightest indication.) So, if you’re actually here, I will have something new within a day or three. Meanwhile you can check the ‘Favorites‘ tab to see just how untrustworthy my personal judgment is.

Profiles of Nature 47

Al Denelsbeck

Yes, it’s another Profiles, perfectly timed to ruin your holiday! Why count on family to do that? Sometimes they disappoint us by failing to disappoint us. That’s why we’re here; like Andy Kaufman, we never fail to bring the pathetic and painful misunderstanding of what humor is!

chimpanzee Pan troglodyte Massimiliano critically examining photographic technique
This week we have Massimiliano (the one on the right,) who’s not a model per se, or per anybody, really, but instead a director of photography, here displaying his disdain over a fan engaging in ‘chimping’ – don’t ask us why we relate to this so much. Massimiliano (his friends call him “Yano,” or at least he thinks they do,) is one of those pompous photographers, quick to talk about the techniques of the masters and offer derision to anyone who uses on-camera flash, but then again, he often indulges in that shaky ‘found footage’ method and thinks shooting on an iPhone is avant garde (and even uses the phrase “avant garde,” and you can hear the italics.) He spends more on camera equipment than most people do on streaming services, which makes for a damn expensive set of cookie cutters – there’s so much matte black in his ‘studio’ that it has an event horizon. When the photos taken with his Leicas don’t garner acclaim, he puts this down to Philistines that cannot appreciate yet another B&W photo of a woman smoking in a darkened café – he thinks ‘trite’ is a beverage. Massimiliano has no plans for retirement, reckoning that all of the most appreciated artists died penniless, so he’s looking forward to cat food. Nonetheless, he secretly dreams about finding a way to make selling out seem ironic or edgy, and hopes that someday, someone will insist on giving him lots of money for his creations, forcing him to acquiesce to remain polite, though there have been no signs of this being imminent (receiving large sums of money or his being polite.) He likes to pepper his conversations with phrases like, “As balky as an Arriflex,” but no one ever bites. Massimiliano’s favorite aroma that exists only in candles is sandalwood.

Join us next week because now it’s just a challenge to see where the actual limits are – of what, we won’t say.

Not too shabby at that

Al Denelsbeck

Why yes, I was out early this morning in pursuit of astronomical shenanigans, to see if our impish little moon was playing hide-and-seek. Well, there was no uncertainty about that, since we’ve possessed the knowledge of orbital mechanics since before we called a hashtag a pound sign – it was definitely going to happen. But there remained the question of whether I would be able to see it. Though let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

[Isn’t the suspense fabulous?]

I took an establishing photo about 20 minutes before the moon was to enter the penumbra of the Earth’s shadow, for comparison’s sake.

full moon before penumbral eclipse, so, full moon
For lunar eclipses, there are two aspects of the shadow that’s thrown. The penumbra is the indistinct outer shadow where light is reduced but no real shape is discernible, and for the most part, you really can’t tell. Astronomers make a big deal of noting this, but your eye will compensate readily, and the reduction of light is considerably less than, say, a thin layer of haze, so big deal. I knew things were going to take a long time and the night was fairly chilly, not to mention my viewing location would be on the side of a lake where the temperature and the wind would make things less comfortable, so I wasn’t in a hurry to begin the sequence, and I aimed to be down there shortly before the umbral eclipse started. The umbra is the distinct shadow that actually has an edge to it, even when it’s not ‘sharp.’

Shortly before the umbral phase began, things looked notably different:

full moon right before beginning of umbral eclipse
We’re into technicalities now, because the moon hadn’t started entering the umbra yet, but you could easily make out a dark shadow at the top by naked eye. The haze and clouds seen during my earlier check (previous post) and even for the top image had blown away by this point, so there were scattered patches in the sky but none near the moon – the ‘seeing’ was pretty good, at least in that direction. Okay then.

A bit of meaningless trivia: While I could easily see the darkened section by eye, and even in the LCD preview after snapping the image, in the viewfinder it was difficult to tell an eclipse was going on at this point – curious.

You might also have noticed, by looking at Tycho’s splash for example, that the moon seems to oriented differently, and it is, because it arcs across the sky. Consider the moon’s south pole to be anchored to our own southern horizon – close enough for our purposes, because it’s not (almost not) the moon’s movement, but the Earth’s, that makes it track across the sky. Meanwhile, we on the Earth’s surface orient ourselves while pointing towards the center of gravity rather than with the axis, so the moon will appear to rotate clockwise over the course of the night.

I made it a point to maintain the exact same exposure setting for a sequence of shots, for comparison, even though I varied things in between. Such as, while the moon was just showing a little chunk out of the top, I did a couple of long exposures by its light, which remained very bright and distinct.

shore of Jordan Lake by light of just-barely-eclipsing moon
This is around 2:30 EST; the umbral eclipse had started about 15 minutes earlier, and the maximum would not be reached for ninety minutes or so. Yes, I could have been more scenic, had I gone exploring, but no, that wasn’t the purpose, and I wanted to remain within earshot of the car given that it was, you know, early in the morning at a presently-abandoned boat ramp. You can see the evidence of the moon reflecting from the little wavelets at the edge of the water, and I got to see an opossum wander through right underneath that dead tree. Immediately above those roots, you’ll see indistinct green blotches that are the leaves of a small sapling, stirring in the light wind, and if you look closely at the sky, you can see the streaks of the stars indicating that this was not a short exposure: 180 seconds, by my mental count, but 173 by the camera’s – might have the get the camera checked.

Not long after that, I did another progress image.

lunar eclipse roughly one-third into umbral phase
The focusing screen within the camera isn’t distinct enough for really critical manual focus, so I made it a point to refocus constantly to ensure that I would get at least one sharp frame at every step. It paid off too; at later stages, I have sequences of photos where the focus was way off, so I’m glad I made the effort.

Wait – did I just ruin that carefully-crafted suspense? The jury will disregard that last statement.

At slightly better than halfway, I purposefully did some exposures for the shadowed side of the moon, which was tricky, because the non-shadowed side was still very bright. Eventually, I aimed the camera to cut out the majority of the lit side, which reduced the glare noticeably.

exposing for the shadowed side of moon during umbral eclipse
This was not visible at all by eye, but we see the hint of red from residual light coming through the Earth’s atmosphere, just like at sunrise and sunset. While the exposures above were at 1/125 sec, f8, ISO 250 (I was shooting through the 2x teleconverter, which reduces light by two stops,) this one was for a full second at f8, seven stops brighter – that’s 128 times more light admitted. And of course, the moonlight was still hitting the lens, just not directly towards the sensor, so the glare was still an issue.

Back to ‘normal’ exposure for this one, a couple of minutes later:

lunar eclipse slightly beyond halfway mark
Now, it looked pretty much like a normal moon approaching 1st quarter – if you weren’t aware of the compass direction and where the lit portion should have been (which was rotated around a bit more to the right) or the fact that 1st quarter had already occurred a week ago.

By the way, I was using the ‘Moony 11’ rule for exposure, which states that on clear nights for a full moon, the aperture should be f11, shutter speed 1/ISO, which since I was using ISO 250 would be 1/250 second. This is a variation of the ‘Sunny 16’ rule for manual exposure in bright sunlight (you know, for normal scenics and all that,) and the moon is illuminated by bright sunlight – but we like it a bit brighter white than it really is, which is pretty damn close to middle-grey, that 18% deal that cameras are actually calibrated for, so we add a stop. Except in my case this morning, as noted, the teleconverter itself reduced light by two stops, so to compensate that’s one stop increase in aperture, one in shutter speed, making it 1/125 second at f8. I would not be able to keep this up much longer.

As the moon approached maximum eclipse, still not total (and it wasn’t going to be,) I fired off a last couple of frames for comparison.

near-total lunar eclipse at exposure setting for full moon
Actually, instead of 1/125 second shutter, this is 1/64 – a stop brighter than those above, so now we’re seeing the effect of the penumbra. However, that’s not very interesting, so let’s go to a proper exposure for the conditions.

near-total lunar eclipse of November 2021 showing distinct earthglow
The band of non-eclipsed moonlight is overexposed now, but we can see the remainder of the moon with some decent detail – this is 1/2 second shutter speed, f6.3, ISO boosted to 800. This remained clearly visible in the sky, but very subtle, and overall it had become a dark night with many more stars visible. I did a number of exposures, bracketing wildly to see what worked best, as well as focus-bracketing because all I could focus on decently was that little sliver of still-lit moon, without any lunar details, so that means just the outside edge. I have more than a few that were well out of focus.

But, stars? Yes, that’s one over to the right, and if you look very closely (and your monitor is adjusted decently,) there’s one to upper left too. Let’s have a better look:

star HIP 16896 barely visible off of eclipsed moon's limb
You recall from my previous post (of course) that a particular star was going to be eclipsed itself by the moon, and that’s the dim little bugger right there – HIP 16896, to be exact, with an even dimmer neighbor, and I tweaked this exposure a little to bring them out better. It was so dim that I never located it in the viewfinder, and ruled out doing any long-exposure still shots, much less video (which, in trying to maintain a frame rate, would go for much shorter shutter speeds than this and not even allow the earthglow to be seen – I know, I tried.) This was about ten minutes before it was due to occur, to give you an idea of actual lunar motion, as opposed to earth rotation. And this is as sharp as it was likely to get as well, since we were now in the realm of getting some of that earth rotation within the span of the shutter speed. Again, someday, I will be working with a tracking motor which will allow longer exposures without worrying about motion, though in this case it would have been difficult, since Polaris (which is what such a tracker needs to be oriented upon) was out of my sight within the trees behind me.

Notably, I saw several Leonids meteors this morning – one so distinct and long that I could follow its progress across the sky. None of them gave the faintest appearance of having ‘originated’ from Leo, and that’s been my experience overall, but at least I saw a handful. Given that, as the moon was dark now, I did a few long exposures in the hope of capturing one. Alas, none showed in the direction that I faced the camera (or indeed, anywhere in my sight during the exposures.) But we’ll have a look anyway.

wide angle long exposure showing eclipsed moon and edge of Orion
That’s the moon bottom center, now overexposed even as dim as it was, with Pleiades near it to its upper right, Taurus just left of center, and Orion peeking in at the left side – you can see the three belt stars. Again, if your monitor is adjusted decently you may be able to just make out the silhouette of a dead tree trunk right of center. But no meteors – the vivid one had cut through this framing, but better than twenty minutes previously.

starfield with Orion
Orion again, and that bright star near center is Sirius; this was both the best view I had in my shooting location, and the darkest sky region, because of both humidity and a lack of city lights within a certain distance. The first meteor I’d seen this morning cut right across Orion’s feet, but that was two hours previously.

long exposure starfield near Leo, with too much light pollution
This was the last shot of the night, and I knew it wasn’t going to be great because I could just make out those clouds in the city glow, but it’s aimed more or less towards the radiant for the Leonids – I think it’s just above this frame, actually, but certainly a lot closer than the moon or Orion was. The tree limbs were blowing in the breeze – this is not a focus issue. And if you’re looking, you can see that the arcs that the stars make reverse; north is off to the left, while the plane of the ecliptic cuts across closer to the right side of the photo on a diagonal, so the stars ‘below’ that are arcing around the southern end of the earth axis, well out of sight below the horizon here in North Carolina. But no meteors. I saw enough to confirm that the storm was active this year, but by this point I wasn’t inclined to pursue them further – I’d been out for over three hours in supremely chilly conditions, and was sore from sitting cross-legged on the ground under the tripod, so that was enough. I got what I was initially after, so I’m good.

Seeing is succeeding

Al Denelsbeck

Are you all set to go out and watch the not-total lunar eclipse tomorrow morning, i.e., a few hours from now? I plan to be down at a reasonably dark sky location to make the attempt, though at the moment, it’s not looking promising – we have scattered thin clouds here right now, but they’re patchy, so it’s impossible to predict which way they may go. It’s been notably clear here for the past several days, so it fits perfectly that the conditions will go yuerch for an astronomical event.

Well, this isn’t quite true; I checked last night, thinking I might make a second, and final, attempt at the Leonids meteor shower, and we had light haze across the entire sky. The moon was visible, with a bit of a halo, and of course almost full at that point and not setting until shortly before sunrise. The light haze would be illuminated by the moon perpetually, across most of the sky, so the haze itself would obscure the dimmer meteors (and stars) while the moonlight scattering through it would make it much worse. Not to mention the reflection of the city lights nearby. The seeing (which is what astronomers call the clarity of the sky – now you understand the post title) was far from optimal, and long exposures would be greyed out by all that light even before the camera registered most of the stars. I didn’t even bother.

Meanwhile, the eclipse will take place over the period of several hours, so even if initially, the seeing looks bad (or, for that matter, good,) it might change over the course of the eclipse. Which means I’ll be out there regardless. For your own plotting, Stellarium will work just ducky.

This will not be a total lunar eclipse, only close – the south pole of the moon will never vanish, though at this time and latitude, that’ll be the lower left edge. From my location, as it approaches maximum, the moon will eclipse a dim star on the upper left side, where the moon itself will be fairly dark (actually, very dim red.) The brightness of the star (HIP 16896) will be pushing magnitude 9 in the best of conditions, which is pretty dim – naked eye visibility in dark conditions runs around magnitude 6. The lower the number, the higher the visibility, so 9 is binocular/telescope range, and capturing it on the camera, even with the long lens, is highly questionable. I could do it with a longer exposure perhaps, but then I’d be contending with apparent motion. It’ll be an experiment, anyway – provided I can see anything when it occurs (which around here will be right at 4:01 AM.)

So, watch this space, is what I’m saying. I mean, after you watch the eclipse itself – I won’t be that fast getting it up. I’m old now.

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