Last night I had trouble taking pictures of the moon. I couldn't get them to turn out like I wanted, and I couldn't remember what settings I used the other night. I didn't write the settings down. I figured out what the problem was this morning though, when I compared the EXIF info of the pictures. I had the f and ISO screwed up. (Hey, that even sounds like what was wrong - the f'ing ISO was screwed up!) I experimented a little more with star pictures too. Here's some of what I did last night: (OH, and one other thing I learned is that if you remove the EXIF info from your picture files before you upload them to the web or e-mail them, it makes the file size WAAAAYYYY smaller! Hmmm, maybe can teach an old dog new tricks.)

The Big Dipper. Can you see it?

Orion The Hunter, setting in the west beyond the pasture, not too far behind the sun.
For the following sequence of pictures, I left everything exactly the same, except that I changed the ISO rating from 1600 through 80. I'm kind of leaning towards the ISO 400 rating as the best, at least for these pictures from last night.

ISO: 1600
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:45 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS


ISO: 800
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:46 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS


ISO: 400
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:47 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS


ISO: 200
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:48 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS


ISO: 100
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:49 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS


ISO: 80
Shutter speed: 15.0 sec
Aperture: f/2.8
Zoom (Focal length): 33mm (equiv.)*
Exposure bias: +0.0 EV
Original image size: 640 x 480 Pixels
Flash used: No
Date taken: Sunday, April 20, 2008
Time taken: 8:50 PM
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS