Woke up about 0130 and couldn't fall back to sleep so I figured I'd try to photograph the Falcon 9 launch. I did, but focus was off and it wasn't a very good shot. While I was waiting for the launch at 0258, I did some shots of the moon with the OM-1 and the 100-400mm zoom.
I took some in hand-held high resolution, some with the 2x digital teleconverter and the last batch with the MC2 teleconverter mounted on the camera.
This is probably the best of the bunch, with the MC2, and I'm fairly pleased with it handheld.
I had difficulty getting the HHHR shots. I eventually ended up with three, and after cropping, they weren't as good as this.
The ones with the 2x digital teleconverter were surprisingly good, better than I'm used to on any of the E-M1s, though they're never really bad. They were nearly as good as this, but just visibly softer.
This is the best one, with the MC2, heavily cropped. I took a lot of frames with the teleconverter on it, and this was the only one that didn't exhibit some motion blur. This is at 1/125s at 800mm (effective focal length 1600mm). This shutter speed is roughly four stops slower than you would use at that focal length without image stabilization. Technique matters and I haven't been practicing much lately. I did lean against a pillar on the house but it didn't seem to help much. Looked steady in the viewfinder, but that's not a real indication.
I could have bumped the ISO to 400 and perhaps had more success with no real noise penalty. I'll make a mental note of that (He said, confidently.) and do that next time.
Until then here's a Groundhog Day moon.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 08:25 Thursday, 2 February 2023