My kid asked why we never see the 'dark side' of the moon in our photos

I was just stacking shots of the gibbous phase from my backyard in Boise and had to explain it's always the same face, not that one side is literally dark. Made me realize how many of my own photos miss the bigger orbital story. Anyone else have a simple way to show lunar libration in a single image?

2 comments

2 Comments

parkerrodriguez1mo agoMost Upvoted

Try a composite shot over a few months. Stitch together photos of the full moon when it's at different points in its elliptical orbit. The slight wobble becomes pretty clear that way.

mason2091mo ago

That's a solid way to visualize libration. I saw a time lapse once where someone did exactly that, lining up the moons by one crater. The way it slowly rotates back and forth over the year is wild. It's because the moon's orbit isn't a perfect circle and its spin is locked, so we get to see a little around the edges. Makes it feel less like a flat picture in the sky and more like a real ball spinning in space.