petego4it Loc: NY

Great input elsewhere from a number of Hogs re: supermoon results. Mine not so much and hard to figure out why. Leads me to this key question: how consistent is quality from same product to same product by the same manufacturer? Are test sample specs and published results for sure what we buy? Does anyone truly and independently assess this like the old Consumer Reports used to?

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

If you buy from a big name photo manufacturer, you're going to get a good piece of equipment. I don't know how carefully they inspect and test each item, but they don't just run them down the assembly line and box them. There will be variations from item to item, but a bad lens will be a rarity.

dcampbell52 Loc: Clearwater Fl

While I can't give you a specific answer, my supermoon pics (because I was in a hurry and didn't do a few things that I normally do) were not so good. I didn't use a tripod (I know, big mistake), I had to keep my ISO high, and I had to shoot at a nearly wide open f/stop so ended up with a very bright moon (no crater details) on a very black background. I could have gotten the same results shooting a pic of a bare lightbulb on a lamp post at night.
What I normally would do is put the camera on a tripod, use my electronic (remote) shutter release, put my ISO at 100, put my aperture at something like f/40 and shoot for a timed shot (probably between 20-120 seconds). Doing that, I get great results. What I got was a bright orb on a black sky. All because I was in a hurry.

par4fore Loc: Bay Shore N.Y.

20-120sec will NEVER give you a shot of a moon, the earth rotates too fast for that??

petego4it Loc: NY

well ideally this is of course true. Skeptically, I believe the manufacturers take special time and testing with the products they send to test or for "their team." In most cases this is no matter. But when it comes to really really sharp and good moon shots for example, tiny tiny differences can arise that end up having quite a noticeable impact.

Bugfan Loc: Toronto, Canada

Test samples and specs are not always accurate. Normally what's done is to average several tests and publish those.

However, when it comes to manufacturing, once you get it right it generally produces consistent quality. The better manufacturers also do test their individual products to a degree so that you will get a good product. That's not to say there won't be the odd bad one, but it will just be the odd one and that is easily fixed under warranty.

To perhaps illustrate this issue, I spent four years working for a company that made airnavigational guidance systems for commercial aircraft, those black boxes that fly our planes these days. I recall a new design that was being developed. The built a few and none of them worked at all. The problem as it was explained to me is that every part has a certain tolerance but that is always measured as a range. Once in a while various tolerances together add up to a problem. That's what was happening with this new device. They tried different workers on different stations, they tried rotating shifts, they tried just about everything to finally get the design to work. And, suddenly, witrhout warning, the forty second one worked. All the systems of that model built after that were perfect and operated according to the specs. What had been the problem remained a mystery.

Our DSLRs are similar to a degree. They too are incredibly complex and represent a collection of tolerances that have to work together. It amazes me sometimes that they work at all. But usually once manufacturing figures out how to make it the design starts to come out according to spec.

pmackd Loc: Alameda CA

If you use a fast enough shutter speed for the focal length of the lens you don't need to use a tripod to get sharp moon shots. 300mm shots I do hand held. 500 mm shots, even with good VR, on tripod.

whitewolfowner

It's the equipment but your experience shooting sky which is one of, if not the most difficult subject there is requiring the best of glass.

Bobspez Loc: Southern NJ, USA

You can get a decent hand held moon shot with any dslr or bridge camera if your equivalent focal length is at least 500mm. That is the main thing, the reach of your telephoto lens. I used an $80 ebay used Nikon 1 J1 camera with a decent, but not exceptional lens, the Nikkor AFS VR DX 55-300mm zoom. I also used the Nikon FT-1 autofocus adapter to use f-mount autofocus lenses on the Nikon 1 J1 camera. Settings were iso-100, f5.6, 1/500 sec., handheld while standing in the middle of my street to avoid getting tree branches in the shot. With the Nikon 1 CX sensor the crop factor is 2.7x, giving the 300mm lens an equivalent focal length of 810mm. Attached is the shot, cropped and with shadows and highlights tweaked in Photoshop. I took a half dozen shots, this came out the sharpest.

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utahcop

I'm just an newbie here, however, I have taken great shots of the moon by setting my humble point and shoot on it's dark setting before taking a pic of the moon. Everything shows up a bit darker, but much clearer.

whitewolfowner

Man, my tongue got in the way of my eye tooth and I couldn't see what I was saying. It happens. What I meant to say was that: It's not necessarily your equipment but your lack of experience of photographing the sky, which is one of the most difficult, if not the most difficult subjects to photograph. To get a quality photo, you need the best of glass (fluorite coatings that are just working their way into camera lenses has been around the astronomy world for years, if not decades), either in the form of mirrors or straight glass or any combination of them. You think camera lenses are expensive; try telescopes, which can easily run well over $100,000.00 and that's and taking about the tripods and tracking devises which can cost well in a access of several professional long telephoto lenses and a professional camera body to boot.

10MPlayer Loc: California

It looks as good as mine using a Tamron 150-600mm.

(Download)

Bobspez Loc: Southern NJ, USA

Your Tamron lens captured fine details that my 300mm lens cannot, even with the 2.7x crop factor. A very fine shot.