Total Lunar Eclipse: 3 March 2026

What makes the Moon so alluring? And, why is a lunar eclipse even more so? I’m not sure, but it was alluring enough to get me up at 4am on a very cold March morning!

1353 words; 11 photographs; 7-minute read

It just so happened that the eclipse would occur during our first night/morning away on a winter retreat—a last fling with what has been one of the best (read ‘snowiest and coldest’) winters in recent memory.

Yes, I like winter. We like winter. Especially when it’s a good winter lie this year with lots of snow and temperatures to keep the snow. To us, even an average winter is preferred to the heat and humidity of summer. I know, Crazy Canucks, though most Canadians do not seem to share our views on winter.

But this is about the eclipse. It’s not uncommon to have clear skies in southern Ontario, but it can also be iffy. This time should be different, as with a cold front comes clear skies. I don’t know how many times in the past, eclipses have been a wash out due to cloud. Not last year’s, and hopefully, not this year, either.

I described my first successful lunar eclipse photo session from a year ago with this result:

Thinking ahead

Planning began in late February, when I first heard the eclipse would happen. I generally use The Photographers Ephemeris for celestial events. I find it intuitive and faster to use than PhotoPills, which is very popular amongst night sky and astrophotographers.

On Site

I began by making some landscape images that could be used for a composite, the eclipse conditions would allow. So, before heading to bed on the night of 2 March, I went down to the frozen lake and made a few Tripod HR images of the view across the lake at night, lit only by the moon. I could drop in any landscape from anywhere, but I prefer to maintain some authenticity to my experience, and to the actual scene in front of me.

It was a beautifully clear night with a good number of stars visible, though not right to the horizon. Could it be the glow of Huntsville to the west or simply some haze, moisture in the atmosphere leftover from a day of sunshine on the mounds of snow around here? Though there wasn’t a lot of melting, sublimation is always happening, especially on sunny days.

I would have preferred a feature in the foreground, a stand of those classic Ontario trees, white pines, would have been perfect, but without driving somewhere, the area around us didn’t work out. Again, the ideal would be to position them and still have lots of sky, but they were simply too dense for that to work. Oh well.

The Eclipse

The earliest phase of the eclipse began at 3:46am. From past experience, I knew there was virtually no change in the moon until a bit later, so i set me alarm for 4am. After putting on layer after layer of base, middle and outer layers—it was only –17°C, but I would be standing around—I was out on site for my first photo at 4:23am. Just a hint of shadow was showing.

The previous night, I had set up the camera for spot metering. This is critical for correct exposure of what is a distant reflective disk surrounded by the black of night. Initially, I left ‘Night Vision’ off until the moon grew very dark. Night Vision increases the gain on the electronic viewfinder (EVF) to see more clearly in dark situations.

From the first exposure, I set a schedule of photos, timing them relatively evenly throughout the event.

The night/morning was still and very quiet. No hoots, nor howls, not even any dogs barking; only the odd vehicle on Highway 60, a hundred metres behind me. It was a clear sky above, though I noticed some haze towards the horizon.

I had a great view across the frozen lake, once I found a gap in the trees, with a path clear of branches right down to the horizon.

Unfortunately, with each successive photo, with the moon sinking lower and lower, the effects of the haze increased. At the same time, the brightness of the moon dipped, forcing higher and higher ISOs. The last few photos were made at ISO 12,800, ƒ8 and shutter speeds as low at ½ second to 2 seconds. While a faster lens would be nice, like the big white, with the TC 1.25x in place, it would only be a 1 EV gain in aperture (ƒ5.6) which will either reduce the ISO to 6400 OR increase shutter speed to ¼ sec. to 1 second. Is a one-stop gain worth $10,000?

As time progressed, of course, the sky became lighter with the approach of sunrise. This was a known limiting factor as TPE clearly showed sunrise at 6:51am. However, before that came Nautical Twilight at 5:47am and Civil Twilight at 6:21am. Sadly, between the brightening sky and the atmospheric haze, ‘my Moon’ disappeared from view shortly after the last photo, made at 6:03am, just two minutes before Totality. Oh well; time to come in out of the cold.

Screen Time

Back in our cabin, I worked on the images, but not right away. While the camera slowly warmed under a cloth bag, we put on the coffee and began warming a nice Chelsea bun.

A half hour later, images were imported into Lightroom and the fun began. Following denoising and sharpening, each image was tweaked for consistency in colour (5100°K) and exposure. I increased Contrast and Whites; slightly reduced the Highlights; and provided a boost in local contrast by increasing Clarity.

Cropping was the most time consuming. With the Moon moving across the sky, I had to reposition the camera-lens set-up on the tripod each time. This meant inconsistency in positioning in the frame. In Lightroom, I changed the Crop Overlay from Thirds to Fifths, then used the 1:1 crop tool to crop right to the edge of the Moon in each frame. Once they were consistent from frame to frame, I expanded the cropped area of each. It would be nice to have an auto-crop, but, so be it.

Compositing

After exporting full-size JPEGs, I used Affinity Photo to assemble the composite. Matching the sky of the landscape and the sky behind the each successive Moon required some bit of trial and error combined with learning new techniques with Affinity, an app I rarely use for photography, other than for compositing.

Each Moon photo was placed and resized to look natural in the sky (okay, maybe a bit large 🙂 ). I dropped the background out then used a combination of erasing and reducing transparency to blend each moon into the existing sky.

From here, I will live with the image for a few days before creating a final work. I find it helpful to put away the work for a while then reflect on it after a few days or a week. I know this is counter to the ‘modern’ notion of expediency and immediacy, ‘getting it out there’, but I honestly don’t care. To me, this kind of work goes beyond the timelines demanded of social media. I’m in it for the long game.

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