Moonrise and Super Moon

Critique Style Requested: Standard

The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.

Description

While camping up at Wilderness State Park, the Super Moon provided an interesting subject. I used my 600mm f4 and a 2x teleconverter for both shots. The moonrise was spectacular and the moon was a pinkish orange in color. I could not quite get that color with post processing. Heat shimmer was also an issue due to extremely warm temperatures and Lake Michigan was radiating a significant amount of heat at dusk. The Super Moon shot was taken on the previous night which was cool and was shot in an open field away from the lake, The next day, I looked at where I shot the image and it was traversed by power lines. I lucked out and missed them during the session.

Specific Feedback

The moonrise is a feeble attempt at night landscape photography. How do you feel about the heat shimmer?

Technical Details

I used DeNoise, Levels, Crop for Comp, and adjusted the exposure dpown to pull out additional details that may have been obscured by the brighter areas of each image.


Critique Template

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  • Vision and Purpose:
  • Conceptual:
  • Emotional Impact and Mood:
  • Composition:
  • Balance and Visual Weight:
  • Depth and Dimension:
  • Color:
  • Lighting:
  • Processing:
  • Technical:

Wow – that is a great illustration of heat shimmer! It’s almost unavoidable shooting through that much atmosphere. Particles of moisture in the air seem to make it worse, almost more than heat. And now there always seems to be some degree of smoke, along with the usual assortment of mundane air pollution. Another kind of atmospheric turbulence can even be affected by the jet stream.

The colors on the rising moon look good – again flavored by some mix of pollution – and nice subtle detail in the trees. I like the sky color, too.

The higher moon has very good detail, both tonal and sharpness. Sounds like it was also low and the color looks authentic. There is a surprising difference in heat shimmer the two nights. Good catches, both!

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