31 Jan 2018
Super Blue Blood Moon in L.A.
Here in Los Angeles, we had one of the best views of the Super Blue Blood Moon that appeared for the first time in 152 years! JJ was up at 3am, heading to a hill in Culver City to capture the event.
The Super Blue Blood Moon can be understood as the coinciding events of a “Blue Moon” (a full moon taking place twice in one month), a “Super Moon” (the moon is orbiting close to earth), and a “Blood Moon” (a lunar eclipse casts a red hue to the moon). How does an eclipsed moon still have light? Well, the earth’s atmosphere allows some light to pass through to the moon. The reason the moon appears to be red is because the earth’s atmosphere filters most blue light, but light closer to red is not as affected, causing the moon to be bathed in a bloody hue.
The last time it occurred was 1866, just after the American Civil War ended. Back then, photography was very rudimentary and quality images of celestial events were lacking.
Today, it is a different story. According to LDV Capital, there are 16 billion cameras in the world as of 2017, and they estimate there will be 45 billion by 2022! Among all those cameras, at least one was trained on the early morning sky on January 31, 2018. Attached to it was a 250mm lens with a doubler, providing 500mm of focal length to a 4K sensor. That’s not the most amazing setup for astro-photography, but its pretty solid for astro-cinema.
Without further ado:
