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Concept
Moonlight
Summary
Moonlight consists of mostly sunlight (with little earthlight) reflected from the parts of the Moon's surface where the Sun's light strikes.
The ancient Greek philosopher Anaxagoras was aware that "the sun provides the moon with its brightness".
The intensity of moonlight varies greatly depending on the lunar phase, but even the full moon typically provides only about 0.05–0.1 lux illumination. When a full Moon around perigee (a "supermoon") is viewed around upper culmination from the tropics, the illuminance can reach up to 0.32 lux. From Earth, the apparent magnitude of the full Moon is only about that of the Sun.
The color of moonlight, particularly around full moon, appears bluish to the human eye compared to other, brighter light sources due to the Purkinje effect. The blue or silver appearance of the light is an illusion.
The Moon's bond albedo averages 0.136, meaning only 13.6% of incident sunlight is reflected from the lunar surface. Moonlight takes approximately 1.26 seconds to reach Earth's surface. Scattered in Earth's atmosphere, moonlight generally increases the brightness of the night sky, reducing contrast between dimmer stars and the background. For this reason, many astronomers usually avoid observing sessions around a full moon.
File:ISS-44 Moon - Goodnight Earth.jpg|Moonlight onto Earth's cloud cover from space
File:Sunrise over the VLT.jpg|Moonlight shines on the [[Very Large Telescope]].
File:Tonsvatnet, tåke og måne.JPG|Moonlight illuminates a lake and surroundings.
File:Giftedtypist - red moon (by).jpg|During a [[lunar eclipse]], the Moon is colored red by indirect [[sunlight]], which [[Earth's atmosphere]] has [[light scattering|scattered]] and [[atmospheric refraction|refracted]].
File:Earthshine Moon.jpg|[[earthlight (astronomy)|Earthlight]] (indirect sunlight reflected from Earth) illuminates the dim side of the Moon, while direct sunlight the bright side.
File:High ISO with long exposure.jpg|With manual [[exposure (photography)|exposure]] settings, photographs taken in moonlight do not appear much different from those taken in [[daylight]].
Official source
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