APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Comments and questions about the APOD on the main view screen.
Post Reply
User avatar
APOD Robot
Otto Posterman
Posts: 5592
Joined: Fri Dec 04, 2009 3:27 am
Contact:

APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by APOD Robot » Sun Jul 11, 2021 4:05 am

Image Find the Moon

Explanation: Where's the Moon? Somewhere in this image, the Earth's Moon is hiding. The entire Moon is visible, in its completely full phase, in plain sight. Even the photographer's keen eye couldn't find it even though he knew exactly where to look -- only the long exposure of his camera picked it up -- barely. Although by now you might be congratulating yourself on finding it, why was it so difficult to see? For one reason, this photograph was taken during a total lunar eclipse, when the Earth's shadow made the Moon much dimmer than a normal full Moon. For another, the image, taken in Colorado, USA, was captured just before sunrise. With the Moon on the exact opposite side of the sky from the Sun, this meant that the Sun was just below the horizon, but still slightly illuminating the sky. Last, as the Moon was only about two degrees above the horizon, the large volume of air between the camera and the horizon scattered a lot of light away from the background Moon. Twelve minutes after this image was acquired in 2012, the Sun peeked over the horizon and the Moon set.

<< Previous APOD This Day in APOD Next APOD >>

User avatar
Ann
4725 Å
Posts: 13843
Joined: Sat May 29, 2010 5:33 am

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by Ann » Sun Jul 11, 2021 4:43 am

Beautiful image. The Moon is as nebulous and ethereal as a dream.

And yet it is so substantial!

Ann
Color Commentator

Antony Rawlinson
Ensign
Posts: 33
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2015 8:21 am

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by Antony Rawlinson » Sun Jul 11, 2021 8:46 am

Oddly, the Moon's disk is quite large in the picture - but very faint. It took me a careful scan of the enlarged image to find it: just right of the frame centre. The lower limb, above the slight bulge in the skyline, is more obvious than the rest of the disk.

User avatar
JohnD
Tea Time, Guv! Cheerio!
Posts: 1593
Joined: Wed Feb 16, 2005 2:11 pm
Location: Lancaster, England

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by JohnD » Sun Jul 11, 2021 11:11 am

https://vecta.io/symbols/198/symbols-ge ... rge-square

If you look VERY carefully, you can see a cat in the picture above. The cat is black, it was taken in a coal celler at midnight and the photographer's flash gun failed. Just thought you would like to know the technical details of this most interesting photograph.

John

User avatar
orin stepanek
Plutopian
Posts: 8200
Joined: Wed Jul 27, 2005 3:41 pm
Location: Nebraska

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by orin stepanek » Sun Jul 11, 2021 11:45 am

spotthemoon_westlake_960_text.jpg
Hard to see; but it is there!

cat-birthday.jpg

Poor kitty; no one at it's B=day party!
Orin

Smile today; tomorrow's another day!

rochelimit
Ensign
Posts: 11
Joined: Sat Sep 08, 2012 9:57 am

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by rochelimit » Sun Jul 11, 2021 12:48 pm

This is exactly what we experience during the last lunar eclipse, in my case it happened during sunset, as I was in Jakarta, Indonesia.

We being astronomy enthusiasts, knew exactly where to look though at first we couldn't see, until I (being the only one wearing no glasses) pinpointed the exact location. It looks exactly like this photo.

My other non-astronomy-enthusiasts friends however couldn't find it at all and thought the sky was cloudy. Actually it was crystal clear.

E Fish
Science Officer
Posts: 136
Joined: Thu Mar 09, 2017 2:29 pm

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by E Fish » Sun Jul 11, 2021 2:36 pm

I found it, although I have to admit that I had to read the description to see what I was looking for before I did. As soon as I read that I was looking for an eclipsed Moon, I scrolled back up and saw it immediately. I was also surprised by how large the disc was in the image. I was thinking it was going to be much smaller.

User avatar
johnnydeep
Commodore
Posts: 3232
Joined: Sun Feb 20, 2011 8:57 pm

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by johnnydeep » Sun Jul 11, 2021 7:44 pm

Utterly failed to spot it. I blame reflections on my laptop display :) All I could see was the much bigger very blurry and very obvious whitish disk (what is that exactly anyway?) and the much smaller white crescent just peeking over the trees on the left (and within the big blurry disk) - what's that?
--
"To B̬̻̋̚o̞̮̚̚l̘̲̀᷾d̫͓᷅ͩḷ̯᷁ͮȳ͙᷊͠ Go......Beyond The F͇̤i̙̖e̤̟l̡͓d͈̹s̙͚ We Know."{ʲₒʰₙNYᵈₑᵉₚ}

User avatar
Fred the Cat
Theoretic Apothekitty
Posts: 975
Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2016 4:09 pm
AKA: Ron
Location: Eagle, Idaho

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by Fred the Cat » Mon Jul 12, 2021 2:40 am

With a little vignette, the moon appears much more obvious.
IMG_1081 (3).JPG
I'm curious about the optical effect in this APOD? :-?
IMG_1070.JPG
And the teaser in its horizon.
spotthemoon_westlake_2128 (2).jpg
Freddy's Felicity "Only ascertain as a cat box survivor"

User avatar
XgeoX
Science Officer
Posts: 215
Joined: Tue Jun 30, 2020 12:57 pm
AKA: Uncle Rico

Re: APOD: Find the Moon (2021 Jul 11)

Post by XgeoX » Mon Jul 12, 2021 11:52 am

Ann wrote: Sun Jul 11, 2021 4:43 am Beautiful image. The Moon is as nebulous and ethereal as a dream.

And yet it is so substantial!

Ann
A really apt description Ann!

Eric
Ego vigilate
Ego audire

Post Reply