Blood Moons: A Game of Light & Shadow

Almost a George R. R. Martin novel.  Almost.

In all seriousness, watching last night's total lunar eclipse was a pretty awesome experience.  While NASA may not consider them to be anything special, considering that there was a 300 year period just before the 20th century where there was a complete absence of blood moons, they still seem pretty awesome and somewhat rare to me.

Alas, I do have two complaints about observing celestial phenomena...

1. They generally involve staying up really late at night, which is just inconvenient since the cosmos don't accommodate a working schedule
   
   and
2. Cloud cover and light pollution mean you have to drive forever to find someplace with an optimal view

Both of those came into play last night/this morning since totality wasn't until 12:45am and our original viewing spot of the beach had to change with the marine layer that rolled in... literally at the precise moment we got out of the car and started walking towards the sand.  It was actually beautifully clear until then.  Fortunately, we had nearly 2 hours from start to finish and were able to head back inland and not really miss too much. 

Since I don't have a telescope, I was relying on my best zoom lens (50-200mm) and a tripod.  And the fact that the moon isn't all that far away really helps.  Since there wasn't a whole lot to change with composition given the distance limitations, this session was really all about the light.  At the end of the day, that is at the core of photography.  This concept was also underscored for me when this girl that happened to be at the same park kept getting frustrated as her little point-and-shoot camera's automatic flash kept going off automatically and blew out all of her snapshots.  I imagine even if she could turn it off, the photos would end up just showing a pinpoint of light anyway, which is what happened with every iPhone photo I attempted to snap. 

Fortunately, with the DSLR, I was able to override automatic modes with manual settings and focus.  I ended up opening the aperture as wide as it would go on the 50-200mm lens (f/5.6) and kept that as a control, so the variable was the shutter speed.  It's interesting how there seems to be a parabolic relationship in terms of light exposure - too much light and the details are lost in the highlights; too little light and the details are also lost, but this time in the shadows.  It's also pretty incredible how much light affects color and how the right lighting conditions can really produce some amazing images.  All of the below photos are digitally unedited with the exception of two that were cropped and yet, they still look pretty visually stunning - a great reminder that digital editing isn't always necessary.

The moon peeking through the marine layer just at the beginning of the eclipse - taken at the beach

Exposed for too long, so the details were lost.  And I freehanded this, so it's slightly blurry.

Further inland and with a tripod, 1/8s exposure @ 12:13am

1/6s @ 12:13am - interesting how the longer exposure resulted in underscoring the red hue as the Earth cast more of its shadow on the moon and made the whole sky darker.

And yet, evidence that photography is still more art than science... this photo was taken with the identical settings as the photo above: 1/6s shutter speed, f/5.6, ISO 3200, and less than a minute after, but looks so different.

Probably my favorite of the series, with the lunar surface detail, but also the copper "blood red".  Shutter speed of 1/5s and 10 minutes before totality

Many Moons
Active Shooting Hours: 1 hour
Review Hours: 1 hour
Hours To Date: 129

The Island of the Pelicans

Innocent sounding enough, but Native Americans avoided it, believing it to be cursed.  Early Spanish explorers initially called it La Isla de los Alcatraces, after the flocks of migratory birds that nest there; it would later be known simply as Alcatraz.  First a lighthouse, then a military garrison and prison, and finally, and most infamously, a federal prison housing only the most troublesome inmates who had a penchant for escape elsewhere.

Even during one of the most beautiful days I've ever experienced in San Francisco and amidst the throngs of tourists, there's something unsettling and eerie about the place.  Beyond the rumors of it being haunted, it's bleak and cold.  The natural light that streamed into the cell block created harsh contrasts and the incandescent lighting inside the cells themselves cast a sickly yellow tinge upon everything and everyone inside them.  It was a stark contrast to the glorious weather outside.

Perhaps the highlight of the trip was meeting an actual former prisoner, Bill Baker.  He has written a book about his experience and happened to be on-island during our visit.  We were fortunate enough to get signed copies and ask some questions... of course the boyfriend being far more thoughtful than I, asked the better question: What would you have mailed yourself, if you could have? He responded hilariously that he would have mailed himself either a pretty woman or a speedboat to get off the island.  It's amazing to me that he was able to maintain good spirits and humor despite all of that time locked up in a bleak environment not optimized to actually rehabilitate anyone.

Freedom and captivity

Welcome to Alcatraz

Cell blocks

A key hanging from the gun gallery

On any other island, it would just be a glorious day.  On Alcatraz, it further underscores the dilapidation.

So close, yet so far.

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Active Shooting Hours: 4
Review Hours: 2
Hours to Date: 132

Halls of Science

72 Nobel prizes, 15 Turing Awards, discovery of 16 elements on the periodic table (more than any other university in the world... Go Bears!), University of California, Berkeley and Berkeley Labs are collectively a heavy hitter when it comes to scientific discovery, research, and contribution.  And then, of course, there's the California Academy of Science... natural history museum by day, club and bar for the scientifically-minded on Thursday nights with its Nightlife events.  Aside from the nostalgia of revisiting old stomping grounds, I wanted to to capture the exploratory, innovative, and erudite spirit of these places in an image.

This was a tough endeavor since the lighting in both places were harsh.  At Berkeley, it was early afternoon with the sun bearing down and buildings created shadow, which resulted in unwanted shadows.  At the Academy of Science, there was harsh overhead lighting in the rainforest exhibit and no flash photography allowed anywhere.  Not to mention people everywhere in both places... and not helpful crowds blending in the background to add to the scene, but random individuals wearing obnoxiously bright and distracting floral patterns that distracted the eye.

Not as successful as I would have liked, but I still managed to have a great time... of course, the drinks at Nightlife helped with that!!

Looking from North side back towards the Campinile... otherwise known as how engineers see campus.

The lighting of this photo is all off since the background is in bright sunlight and the foreground has the bear statues in the shadow of the building to the right.  Opening the aperture or slowing shutter speed resulted in blown out sky and bears that were in shadow.  I'm not sure this could have been corrected with just the camera given the natural light and short of waiting for the sun to be in the right spot at the right time.  Even with a neutral density filter that would tint the sky and not the ground, the vertical lamppost and the Campanile itself would be exposed incorrectly since they both would cross the neutral density filter line.  Tricky.

Pterodactyl in the Valley Life Sciences Building

Rainforest dome in the California Academy of Science... it was 80 degrees and 80% humidity in there!

Monster of the deep.

Looking up.

More Science

Active Shooting Hours: 1.5
Review Hours: 1
Hours to Date: 124.5