Yosemite Shutter Geeks

Sleuth astronomers in Texas announced last month that they had unraveled a minor mystery from the career of Ansel Adams: The exact date and time he shot one of his most famous images, “Autumn Moon.” By locating the site from which Adams took the picture and doing lots of number work, the astronomers figured that the shutter snapped at 7:03 p.m. on September 15, 1948, The team calculated the same alignment of Earth and moon occurs precisely every 19 years; thus, everything ought to line up the way Adams saw it at 7:03 p.m. on September 15, 2005.

Armed with that knowledge, there was only one thing for Adams geeks to do: Go up to Yosemite to try to capture the scene. Ben Margot, an Associated Press photographer who was snapping pictures for the Alameda Times-Star when I was there in the early ’80s, was one of those who made the trek. SFGate has his story (and some of his images) of the event.

(Naturally, the copy editor in me screams, “Autumn Moon”?! It was still late summer!)

(And here’s another, less neutral take on last night’s photo-pilgrimage. I also note that that post and others freely use the copyrighted Adams and AP images.)