Harvest Moonrise – In A Colorado Minute (Week 178) from Luci Westphal on Vimeo.
When I shot this video of the moon rising above Ft. Collins, Colorado, seen from the foothills around the Horsetooth Reservoir, it was already the night after the official full moon. But as you can see the Harvest Moon still shines brightly and very orange until it turns white among the clouds.
Scott
and I had seen the magnificent orange Harvest Moon the two evenings
before – but it wasn’t until the second time when we happened to see it
from the foothills that the idea of shooting a timelapse video came up.
So the next night we camped out and had one of the most romantic few
hours watching the entire moon rise. I can only recommend it! Bring a
little patience (just like when watching this video, you might have to
watch the stars for a while first). Around this time of year the moon
rises 40 minutes later from evening to evening. Two days before it was
already up while the sun was still out. This time we knew it wasn’t
going to appear until it was already dark. Therefore, don’t expect it to
light up the sky around the same time as the evening before.
For
me this was extra special because we had seen the Super Moon and a Blue
Moon, respectively, on my previous two times in Colorado this summer –
and this one was definitely the best for many reasons. (For a little
insider information: check out the song “Harvest Moon” by Neil Young)
The song is an instrumental version of “Take My Sad Away” by Four Dollar Wine (aka Thimo Sander and Scott Solary).
For those interested in technical aspects. I shot this with my Canon 60D
as a series of photos (one every 3 seconds) with an auto-exposure on a
slightly windy evening on a not-so-great tripod. After I turned the
photos into video clips (25 fps), I used smooth cam in FCP to get rid of
some of the bounce. It worked on some clips, but made others much worse
(apparently it would lock into the movement of a plane or something).
The next time-lapse video you’ll probably see from me is one featuring
just the moving stars of the night sky…
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| The 2013 Harvest Moon over Fort Collins, Colorado |