Okay, I’ll admit there is no rabbit in this photo, so don’t bother looking. That was just a hat-tip to the song playing in my iTunes right now, “Rabbit in the Moon” by Scott Hardkiss. There is, however, one really cool feature of this photo. Did you pick it out? In the upper left, right along the terminator, is an illuminated rim of a crater that stands out from the rest.

The terminator is not Arnold “GIT TO DA CHOPPA” Schwarzenegger when we’re talking astronomy; rather, it’s the line between day and night, light and dark, the illuminated and non-illuminated part of a moon or planet. Notice the nice, gentle gradient of the terminator’s edge…and how it’s boldly interrupted by the rim of the crater. Cool, huh?

I took this photo in the late afternoon, some might say early evening. It’s the best time to photograph the moon because the sky behind it isn’t dark. While properly exposing for the detail in the moon, you still get some color in the sky surrounding it. At night all you get is a bold white or gold disk in a sea of black. I suppose that’s fine if that’s what you’re going for, but I prefer to show a little bit of blue.