COLD MOON

Little story on what might end up as my Opus Magnum shot. I went up to Lech because I knew they had snow, and actually didn’t really have a plan on what to shoot. After wandering around in the woods for a bit during golden hour, I decided to see if I could actually get to a decent vantage point of the town for dusk, my favorite time to shoot. While crossing a random field to get Lech behind me, I looked back to see how the framing would look. I then noticed a strange light just on the top ridge of a distant mountain, and was rather confused. I thought it was a lift or a mountain chalet, but based on what I knew of the area, there was no life that I knew in that direction. I then realized, as this bright bridge began to increase in size, shouting to myself, “HOLY S(*&#$@, THAT’S THE MOON!”. I had totally forgot it was the December full moon, nick named “Cold Moon”, named so as in ancient times it used to signal the true start of winter. I threw down my pack to rip out my gear as fast as I could, realizing I had a precious few minutes before it would move rightwards and behind the next mountain. For about 15 (very cold) minutes, I captured as many images as I could of this fantastic arrangement, and then, before it could even hide behind the next mountain, the moon was smothered by a heavy cloud that had moved in. Clocking in at 13954 by 5904 pixels, this shot is a monster 82 megapixel shot. No idea when, if ever, this shot will be able to be reproduced - would need some astro folks to comment. A few more goodies to come from this outing, the shooting was quite literally incredible on this day. Swipe through for detailed clips of the full image.