Differences in the Moon's Surface Albedo and Mineralogy

[Rick]

There was a brief note in an EPOD that featured two different views of a full Moon taken using a Seestar and post-processed different ways. Take a look...

https://epod.usra.edu/blog/2025/07/differences-in-the-moons-surface-albedo-and-mineralogy.html

[Dave A]

Rick,

That is really interesting- great to see images of the moon side by side showing a different perspective

[Hugh]

Thanks Rick

The false colouring can be so helpful in identifying certain aspects of the Moon (or whatever) but I just sometimes wonder whether expecting to see this when observing, especially for the first time, can lead to disappointment.

It's progress though!

~ Hugh

[Rick]

whether expecting to see this when observing

Yeah, that's where labels like "visual", "enhanced" and "false colour" make a difference, if well enough explained. For all but the brightest and most well-defined subjects (like the Moon and planets) an astro-image almost always gives a very different view to the one you'd see with your own eye. For some objects (take the Orion Nebula, for example), it's very difficult to capture in an image what you'd see with your own eyes. Modern imaging kit makes it less difficult, but also far more tempting to go for enhanced and false-colour images.