May 29th, 2017, 9:40 p.m. local time
Keeping notes on your past work is a good thing. When I saw the Moon above, I knew it would make a good picture through my DSLR. But then I thought, “which camera settings are needed tonight?” Fortunately I keep a log from my past images, so I know at least approximately what the settings should be.
Using the manual settings from prior shots in April of a much fuller Moon, I knew what to try for this crescent Moon. My only concern was that since these settings were for a fuller/brighter Moon that I would have to increase the exposure. But I think it turned out fine, reaffirming my camera’s “Moon settings” with its longer lens.
And here is a tip for checking camera settings on an image. Most newer cameras should store these settings as part of the image file’s metadata. I don’t know about Mac OS, but in Windows if you right-click on the image, choose Properties, and click the Details tab, you should see the camera’s settings somewhere there from when you took the picture. Note that this might not work for videos, only still pictures, but may vary by camera.
