The first one in the showcase is an HDR stacked image of different exposures during totality. A lot of the pictures in the showcase are diamond ring effects, dangerous pictures taken with no solar filter while a part of the Sun's disc is still visible - I was careful not to look through the view finder for these, if I damage my camera, it's better than damaging my eyes. Some are of of the Baily's beads effect, right before the moon totally covers the Sun, the valleys on the Moon let some direct sunlight through, but the mountains block out to the edge of the Sun's disc. This leaves small beads of the Sun's disc visible - these are similarly dangerous pictures.
I drove out to Bowling Green, OH for the total solar eclipse. It was freaking cool, again - just like the 2017 total solar eclipse. Like indescribably cool. Pictures don't do it justice, though I got some really good pictures this time. During a totality of a total solar eclipse, it's actually safe to look at the Sun without eye protection. But the Sun is not safe to look at during a partial or annular eclipse.
I chose Ohio because my uncle owned property in the path of totality, so it was easy to stay with him and not worry about a hotel or airbnb canceling me to price-gouge someone else. When planning, I decided not to take any totality pictures through the telescope because I didn't want to cut off any corona. But I don't have any optics that zoom between 200mm (4x) and the telescope at 970mm (19.4x). Which means all my totality pictures are through the 200mm lens. But all the partials are through the telescope. My diamond ring and Baily's beads pictures are also through the telescope. I had hoped to get a long exposure to show earthshine (the unlit side of the Moon dimly illuminated by the sunlit earth), but the corona washed out my long exposures.
Because I only have one tracking mount, I spent time switching from telescope-mode to camera-mode and when I was switching back, 3rd contact happened before I could take any pictures. So I missed the second chance at diamond ring and Baily's beads. I got the first set, so it's still cool.
Obligatory partial/totality composition: (also available as a 1:3 ratio version here)
I got a Sun halo picture on my phone camera during the partial phase, and there's a lens flare showing the shape
of the sun at that time:
I was playing around with the various settings in Lightroom and Topaz and pushed some of them to their extremes.
What I got is clearly an abuse of the photo touchup software, but it was so cool looking, I had to keep
it. It looks kind of like the album art for Neon
Pill
