The Moon & The Hickory Tree

I took the garbage can down to the street last night, and turned to look up at the moon, as I always do, when it is visible in the sky. There were high thin clouds in front of the moon, which spread its light over a larger area, and made the silhouette of the hickory tree more obvious. I grabbed a tripod from the car and set about shooting. I moved around to put the moon where I wanted it, in the arms of the tree, then I needed to figure out what I wanted the picture to look like, based on the exposure time I selected. I tried longer exposures, which made a lighter picture, and showed more branches, but then after some thought, decided I liked the darker image which showed a bright spot in the center, but much less detail in the darker areas away from the moon. More mysterious, I thought.