To The MOON !

The Moon doesn't get the respect it ought at times... it's brightness overwhelms the fainter "prettier" objects in the night sky. But it is there, beckoning to be paid some attention to. So last night, with high clouds pushing in I gave it some love.
First of all, an HDR image of it. HDR stands for "high dynamic range" photography. One takes a few under-exposed shots, some normal exposure shots and some over-exposed shots. Then a HDR program aligns and puts them all together. Of course, I pushed it beyond what one normally sees but this is HDR, you know.
DATA: Meade LX200GPS 8" telescope, Canon T3i camera. Prime focus. Post processed with Aurora HDR 2019 software.

Then I used the movie mode of the Canon camera, with its ability to zoom in on specific areas of the Moon to create some short movie clips. As you know, movies are nothing more than individual photos presented in rapid succession to create the illusion of movement.

Software can take those individual shots, find the sharpest ones and stack them for the best possible capture. Then another bit of software can sharpen it up even more!

There are times as the Sun's light moves across the Moon, that certain features stand out better than at other times. Last night the illusion was of an "X" on the terminator (edge) of the light/dark of the Moon.

Here it is up close!