Astronomers have pinpointed the moment Ansel Adams clicked the shutter on his famous photograph, Autumn Moon, the High Sierra from Glacier Point. It was taken on 15 September 1948, at 1903 precisely.
Don Olson, at Texas State University, San Marcos, US, and colleagues used a combination of lunar tables, maps, weather records and planetarium software to establish the moment, which had been in doubt.
Although Adams was meticulous about recording the technical details of his shots, film types, lens settings, exposure speeds and so on, he was terrible at recording times and places. Some commentators had thought the shot dated from 1944.
Olson also led a team to Yosemite National Park, California, earlier in 2005 to pinpoint where Adams had been standing. They found the location, just off the trail below the Geology Hut at Glacier Point. “We were actually surprised that we could achieve this accuracy, but our comparison photos show that the view changes noticeably if you move ten feet in any direction,” says Olson.
The final test comes this autumn when, the team predict, the exact celestial scenario captured by Adams will reoccur. Roger Sinnot, Sky and Telescope magazine’s senior editor, plans to travel with Olson to recreate the photograph on 15 September – if the weather grants them a clear night.
“We know that the Moon will be in the same place, the mountains will be in the same place and we’ll be in the same place. Unfortunately, we can’t say the same about the clouds,” says Sinnot.
Previous work by Olson has calculated the date of the first Marathon race, and the exact hour captured in a famous painting by Van Gogh.
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17:45 21 August 2008
11:17 21 August 2008
