The Moon: Taking advantage of 30,000km of manual zoom

This past Friday, December 12th 2008, there was a full moon that was closer to earth then at any time in the last 15 years due to the Moon’s elliptical orbit.

For this pass the moon was a little over 350,000km away from the northern hemisphere, about 30,000km closer then usual, and appeared brighter and slightly larger then usual (14% bigger and 30% brighter.)

This particular full moon was an amazing sight, especially when it was close to the horizon due to what is called “moon illusion,” our brains interpreting it to be larger then it really is.

The night here happened to be crystal clear so I set up my Nikon D300 with tripod and Tamron 300-500mm lens and took a few photos.

Then I forgot about them until I downloaded that particular memory card this morning. I think the moon being a little closer gave a bit more detail. I guess 30,000km of “manual zoom” would make some difference. ;-)