There are few things as faithful as the lunar phases. Every
28 days we can count on another full moon and unless my schedule or the weather
ruins it I will take every opportunity to try to shoot some more beautiful moonlit
portraits. Last month I experimented until I got things the way I wanted them
and finally after two nights of shooting I got a great portrait of my son. This
month I picked up where I left off in June and almost immediately got a couple
more amazing images. The first one is my lovely wife Mary, and with her
assistance I even got a selfie.
There is definitely something about the light of the full
moon that greatly enhances these portraits. I may have to try shooting similar
portraits during the day to prove it to myself but I do not believe that
anything else I could do (other than shooting by the light of the full moon),
even with studio lighting would produce images as unique and pleasing. This is
especially true when you consider I am shooting at f-2.8, ISO 12,800 with a 1
to 1.5 second exposure.
Of course part of the credit must go to the excellent
on-board processor of the Pentax K-S1 for the quality of the images. These are
jpegs pretty much right out of the camera with very little post processing.
