Lunar occultation of Mars

On January 13, I had the opportunity to photograph the lunar occultation of Mars, which is a celestial event where the moon passes in front of Mars.

To capture the event, I used my Sony a7iii and my longest zoom lens mounted on a tripod. Since Mars is significantly dimmer than the moon, I had to overexpose the moon to ensure Mars would be visible in the images.

Mars and the moon before the occultation

The start of the occultation was partially obscured by light clouds, which actually added an interesting atmospheric effect to the images.

Mars just before the moon passes in front of it

The moon while it’s passing in front of Mars

The sky was clear by the time Mars made its reappearance on the other side.

Mars re-emerging after the moon passed in front of it

After all that, I took some of the still images from the evening and made a timelapse using a series of apps: Adobe Photoshop, LightRoom Classic, Premiere Rush, and After Effects.