I’m Laszlo Beinrohr from Budapest, Hungary. Recently, I made an interesting short video of a full Moon rising above a picturesque lookout tower along with its visitors. What distinguishes this video from many is that it is completely real. The Moon was not photoshopped or enlarged. It is also special that time is not sped up: you can see it in the movement of the people in the video and the way the flags are waving. Indeed, the Moon rises such fast, but usually we do not notice it, because we do not have a reference point in the 'blank' sky.
The video shows the Empress Elisabeth Lookout tower on János Hill in Budapest, Hungary. It was taken on 2023-02-05 (for my American readers 02/05/2023), shortly after sunset, between 16:50-17:00 CET. The Moon's bright yellow colour is due to the fact that it was low in the sky at this time. It's not obvious from the video, but it was taken from a distance of more than 4 km (2.5 mi) away. This required a telescope with large focal length (>1500 mm), which means high magnification and which allowed the tower to fill the image. At the same time this made the Moon look large. Because it was taken at such a high magnification, the Moon's path is visible in real time. Making a video with the precision needed is hard: once recording begins, there is no turning back. It is not practical to move the setup if the location turns out to be wrong.
In addition to the conditions of making the video, the processing of the video was also a challenge. It is highly recommended to watch the video in full screen, high resolution.
The following interesting tidbits can also be observed in the video.
(1) First, perhaps the most obvious: the continuous vibration of the air. It is for the same reason that makes air seem to boil in the summer heat.
(2) The yellow colour of the Moon is yellowish for the same reason that the rising or setting Sun is yellowish/reddish. Interestingly, the upper edge of the Moon is bluish, the lower edge is orange-ish. This is not a fault in the telescope optics, but is due to the atmospheric reflection, and is most noticeable when the Moon is low on the horizon.
(3) The sharpness is so high, that even a small drone can be observed just above the tower along with its controller.
Thank you for watching! Inquiries welcome.
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Giant Moonrise over Empress Elisabeth's Lookout
'Centered' - an actual frame from the video (reduced-size)
