FredB,

You have done a good job of keeping the Moon in the frame. You were obviously doing manual tracking.

You do know that for a lot of money you can get a motorized equatorial mount and tracking computer that would keep that moon locked in the center of the frame.

I have no idea how to keep that moon in the center of the frame in PD.

Maybe using Motion and keyframes in the PIP designer.

Looks like a lot of work. Carl312: Windows 10 64-bit 8 GB RAM,AMD Phenom II X4 965 3.4 GHz,ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB,240GB SSD,two 1TB HDs.

Yes, I would LOVE to have a motorized tracker $$$.

I figured keyframes might play into it, but I am sure someone here has tried something similar and has some tips.

That video is actually about 90 minutes, but sped up times 10.

Is there any way to see the raw footage. Was your camera tripod mounted or hand held?

You could break the original video up into sections where each section would be between your adjustments to the camera to re-centre the moon. Then use Magic Motion to track the moon in each section. Use a quick fade between sections.

dkinaz1;

I guess I was hoping for a way to "lock-on-to" an object in the video and keep it centered by throwing away the rest of the content...o, wait..that was in a science fiction novel I read.

Here is a quick snippet (and a DXDIAG file, too...since I have forced so many to post theirs )
Ultra64 10.0.0.1129a

Quote: I guess I was hoping for a way to "lock-on-to" an object in the video and keep it centered by throwing away the rest of the content...o, wait..that was in a science fiction novel I read

... or in webcam software, if you could get it to lock onto the face of the man in the moon.

Seriously, that would be a VERY nice addition to PD.

Hi Fred,

I have just thought of a suitable shorcut which might work.

1. Focus your camera on the moon, take your video
2. In an Image Editor create a black large round circle on a transparent background in a png format.
3. bring the image into PD10 and place below the Moon shot track
4. Using PiP Designer and a suitable Motion Path move the overly large (Earth size (ha ha)) shaped black image across the face of the moon, so the Moon is obscured.
5. Beats staying up till the small hours!!

For those who feel I'm being a bit too lighthearted in my reply. I am. I have already by PM given Fred some serious information and have had a lighthearted exchange.

Dafydd

Yes...too funny Dafydd...I might just try that using a suitably colored semi-opaque (on a transparent background) disk, just to see how it looks.

Yes I did get your PM with possible solutions. I sure wish they still made the inexpensive solution below,. for us amateur Astronomers :
http://www.optcorp.com/product.aspx?pid=439-1287-16054

Hey FredB, I thought you might be able to do it by doing a video crop. Setting frame markers with the same frame size throught the video. Then trying to center the blue diamond in the middle of the moon at each marker. It semi worked, but there is still some movement.