The Perigee Moon of May 6, 2012

The Moon made its closest pass by Earth in decades on a day when haze from a fire in Arizona made getting good photographs seem impossible. When I arrived at my overlook, I looked out at a great haze and almost gave up.

But then, as if by magic, the ghostly Moon rose through the desert dust

Amazingly, over the next hour the dust completely cleared, and the magnificent Moon rose over Las Vegas:

As the Moon rose farther above the city, the dust color faded away and the Moon became the silver apparition we know so well:

Then, just for fun, I shamelessly Photoshopped a larger orange version of the Moon into the evening sky. These days, you just can't believe anything you see...:

Guilty.  Sigh.

It is a nice effect, though. For those interested, I put a short show on this on YouTube. Hope you like it!   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8hSCr5eKJs&list=UULq-6JrVItrjLnZtdfZa-2g&index=1&feature=plcp