# "Moon Flare"



## ImgPro (Sep 29, 2009)

Great moon, venus and halo tonight. Several shots did not produced what I desired. Settled for this.







Comments always welcome.

Craig


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## ducky (Sep 29, 2009)

holy crap thats awesome. did you use some kind of mega telephoto zoom lens? i can never seem to produce an image of the night time sky like that....


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## ImgPro (Sep 29, 2009)

Thanks Ducky. Technical info: Nikon D700 tripod mounted using a remote shutter release, Nikon 80-400 mm VR at 400 mm, 1/400th sec @ f/10, ISO 800, exposure compensation -4.0.


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## ducky (Sep 29, 2009)

i love how the moon literally just stops thin air. thanks for the new desktop


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## jsoeung (Sep 29, 2009)

wow 
wow this is so so good.
blew my mind.


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## Craig J (Sep 30, 2009)

Good work, Craig. The title leads one to believe this was some natural event. Wink, wink. We moved here from another forum and I know he is tricky.

Regardless of how you did it, its an amazing shot. Keep them coming.

Craig


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## ImgPro (Sep 30, 2009)

Thanks jsoeung and CJ. Just a good moon night and a little PS magic for fun. Has anyone else noticed we seem to spend more time processing than shooting now days. As one who started with film and darkrooms over 40 years ago I'm still getting use to the digital age. But isn't it great.

Craig


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## Craig J (Sep 30, 2009)

Aw shucks, just a little PS magic, Huh! Maybe your next workshop should be called "Dark Side of the Moon". Looking forward to the Safari Workshop. It is coming up soon.

Craig

Photo Safari Workshop at Fossil Rim Wildlife Center


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## inTempus (Sep 30, 2009)

ImgPro said:


> Thanks jsoeung and CJ. Just a good moon night and a little PS magic for fun.


I was about to scream foul for using PS to make lens flare... and then I read your "coming clean" post admitting PS trickery.  

Cool pic though.


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## ImgPro (Sep 30, 2009)

inTempus,

Foul??? Show me where I claimed this image was not PhotoShopped. Only the most neophyte digital photographer would not recognize that this photograph was altered. Furthermore, trickery is not a good description for a picture that has been enhanced using whatever means available to produce an artistic effect. Even Ansel himself would be the first to tell you he manipulated his best images in the darkroom to achieve his outstanding results.

Hope you know I'm only pulling your chain. Thanks for your comments.

Craig


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## astrostu (Oct 1, 2009)

Okay, guess I'll be the first to say I think that it looks tacky.  It also looks completely unrealistic.


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## UUilliam (Oct 1, 2009)

How you got good comments on this atall
I dont know...
the moon itself is good and crisp
but the photo shop edits are terrible (The Teal border, the lens flare)

+ a lens flare on a moon? just doesnt go well...
however if you do wish to do a lens flare in the future, and easier and a more realistic way to do it is:
(you need to use the shortcut for newlayer or go Layer > new layer otherwise you wont get a menu)
in the menu, change blend mode to softlight
you will see a check box saying "fill with 50% grey?" check it
apply your lens flare to this layer, change opacity to blend the flare in
much neater results


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## astrostu (Oct 1, 2009)

UUilliam said:


> How you got good comments on this atall
> I dont know...
> the moon itself is good and crisp
> but the photo shop edits are terrible (The Teal border, the lens flare)



Ah yeah, I forgot to mention the border in my reply.  I think it just adds to the overall tackiness.


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## ImgPro (Oct 1, 2009)

I must have done something right. Any image that evokes comments form "wow" and "awesome" to "tacky" and "terrible" has sure hit a nerve somewhere. I thought it was garish myself, but you never know what someone else will think until you throw it out there. Thanks for all the opinions.


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## beni_hung (Oct 1, 2009)

You _settled_ for this?? It's awesome!


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## NateS (Oct 2, 2009)

ImgPro said:


> I must have done something right. Any image that evokes comments form "wow" and "awesome" to "tacky" and "terrible" has sure hit a nerve somewhere. I thought it was garish myself, but you never know what someone else will think until you throw it out there. Thanks for all the opinions.



Yes, you did something right.  You blew the minds of amateur's that are inexperienced in photography.  Almost every positive comment was posted by someone with less than 50 posts.  While low post count doesn't always mean amateur photographer, it usually does.


I agree that it looks a little tacky and overdone.  Your lens flare is actually behind the moon??  It's really too bad because without the huge flare and ugly border, it's a really great image.


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## ImgPro (Oct 2, 2009)

NateS,

You have a point about low-post members being primarily amateur photographers; however, how does that account for someone like me. New to this forum? Yes. New to photography? Not hardly. I'm a professional photographer with over 40 years of experience. Does that make me any good? Not necessarily, but I do know which end of a lens to point at a subject and how to process a photograph using Photo Shop and other image processing programs. Can I produce technically correct digital photographs? Sure. Do I also know how to alter an image to produce something a little off beat? Yep. Is it great art? Only occasionally if I'm lucky, but I hope my efforts inspire some of those amateurs to think outside of the box and experiment with post processing just to see what they can come up with.

I hope you understand I'm not defending the image I posted or my meager talents if any exist. I'm simply saying every image posted on this forum is somebody's idea of a good picture. I only hope we can help guide those less experienced to experiment with their photography in order to achieve a higher level of artistic expression. Are we in agreement?

Craig


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## belindab (Oct 12, 2009)

Craig[/quote] Are we in agreement?



WOW you have a wonderful way with your words! Being a complete newbie this sounds like some GREAT advice. Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts and yes, I am in complete agreement!


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