"Wanting a more realistic look to my harvest moon?

Question

It is really splotchy and wanted a more realistic harvest moon ,,have black for the crators on the moon then orange on part of it and also yellow ,,,could we go all over it with white to bring out a more grey in the black and lighten the orange and yellow to make it more realistic

Answer 1

add red the harvest moon isnt that milky, at its peak it is almost blood red

Answer 2

Add shadows and contrast colors.

Answer 3

To my eye the craters are not particularly evident in photos of a "Harvest" moon.

The main impression I get is the familiar pattern of the maria or the dark lava plains. Marias are what create the impression of the "Man on the Moon".

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=h...

I keep hearing my art teacher saying "Paint what you SEE" and really without at least some binoculars we don't really see much of the craters, aside from the largest ones like Tycho (in the southern hemisphere) with its  ejecta rays that are a beautiful silvery color on the non-harvest full moon. This image gives a good view of Tycho as well as well defined maria.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=h...

There IS still some ejecta visible on a "Harvest Moon" but it too takes on a reddish cast and is not nearly as apparent.

Anyway I would play up the contrast and shape of the maria keeping within your color scheme.

Here are more images of a non-harvest moon that may give you a better idea of the shapes:

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=...

Good luck, it's a great learning subject, for Art AND Astronomy:)

Is it possible for you to post the finished work here on YH answers? Using Flickr Photo Sharing : http://www.flickr.com/ or something? I would really like to see it.