Noticed a bunch of astro photos getting the moon reflection wrong

I was scrolling through the subreddit last night and kept seeing people post shots of a lake or ocean at night with a perfect moon reflection. The thing is, the reflection line was straight up and down like a mirror. But in real life, the reflection on water actually spreads out horizontally when the moon is low on the horizon. I only figured this out because I stood on a dock near my house in Tampa Bay last month and stared at it for like 20 minutes. Am I the only one who gets bugged by this detail in photos?

2 comments

2 Comments

oscarcooper1mo ago

Have you ever considered it might be a focal length thing messing with people's brains? I spent a summer shooting long exposures off the Gulf coast here in Florida, and I noticed that if you're using a telephoto lens like 200mm or more, it squishes the perspective so the reflection looks narrower than it actually is. A wide angle lens, on the other hand, exaggerates that horizontal spread you're talking about. So some of those photos might be getting the physics right but the lens is tricking the eye into thinking it's a mirror. Then again, I could be totally wrong too.

rivera.henry1mo ago

Try cropping a telephoto shot to rule out the lens trick.