Taming Lunar Contrast at the terminator

[Hankmeister3]

Another image from my lunar archive of last Fall. I mostly experimented with tonal adjustments and unsharp masks which with my ArcSoft PhotoStudio seems to make a really significant difference in the sharpness of the final image.

This is a single-frame image with two layers of manipulation. I ultimately made very subtle changes in brightness/gain/luminance, contrast, multiple tone adjustments, two layers of unsharp masking and despeckling, the latter feature smooth the "grain" of the single-frame quite a bit in this case.


SW EQ6-R Pro (Lunar tracking mode)
Canon EOS 80D unmodified
Effective focal length 4800mm
1/5 second, ISO 500
Single-frame with two layers
No filters
Image has been cropped roughly 2X

[Hankmeister3]

Hmmmm. For some reason when I post lunar images on this forum, it tends to brighten my images about 20 to 30%. I'm pretty confident my monitor is properly calibrated and even if it isn't it doesn't explain how the images appear "normal" to my taste in my PhotoStudio window and when posted on this forum the images get significantly brighter. My colr DSO images brighten a bit too on the DSO forum but only about 10 to 15%.

Anyway, I went back and reduced the luminance/gain on my two lunar images and reposted them here ...

[515bonner]

There is an EXCELLENT youtube video by Robert Reeves which details how he goes about his lunar imaging and processing. A LOT of good information and some debunking of other.


Rob Robinson

[Hankmeister3]

Thanks Rob, I'll check it out tomorrow.

[bladekeeper]

Nicely done, Henry!

Gotta love the shadow play in the craters.

[Hankmeister3]

Thanks, Bryan. I just saw your latest Lunar/Venus post. Awesome, sir!