Planning ahead was the name of the game. I was alerted to the occurence of the full lunar eclipse through the app Photo Pills early in 2025. Never having shot a lunar eclipse, the research began. Now, you can really get deeply involved in shooting one of these with specialized equipment like motion trackers that will allow for the rotation of the earth to follow the moon, special filters and much more if desired.

I did not want to go down that rabbit hole as I just wanted some pictures of the moon while it was completely in the umbra, the earth’s shadow. Knowing this, I went to the aforementioned app Photo Pills to begin planning. I was able to find when, and where I wanted to be to capture the shot I wanted.

The entire event, from start to finish, lasted about seven hours. I knew I did not want to be up for the entire event, so I set the alarm to go off about one half hour before the complete eclipse. I had the equipment set up the night before which consisted of my 400 f/4.5, my Nikon Z9 and I had the 1/4 teleconverter if I needed to extend my reach. All of this on my tripod to avoid any camera shake or added motion.

With all that ready to go, all I had to do was walk outside of our house to the point pre-designated by using photo pills, setup and shoot. Initially, I was going to go with my 600 f/4, but once I looked up, and saw the star field, I decided to not go in super tight and include the stars. I like this composition better. Settings in case anyone is interested is listed below:

• Nikon Z9
• Aperture: f/8
• Shutter Speed: 2 seconds
• Focal length: 560mm (with 1.4 teleconverter)
• ISO: 6400