I've posted the quick preview of photos on facebook, but haven't had
time to sit down and seriously go through my photos from the past week.
For those a bit more interested in the experience itself, and what I've
learned about photographing eclipses:
TLDR; Due to ignorance and lack of preparation, I made some crucial
mistakes, however despite all of that, considering my resources of time,
money, energy etc. I still had an amazing experience, got a few photos
that I don't need to be ashamed of, and managed to strike a reasonable
balance between "being there" and taking home some trophy photos.
I do hope to start posting some other photos from the trip soon.
snipped from my post on facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/ellarsee/posts/10155712088594673
That was the shortest 121 seconds of my life.
There are things that cannot be understood until they've been
experienced, and a total solar eclipse is definitely in that category.
I've heard a lot of people say that they didn't want to go because: they
aren't interested in science, it's not worth a long drive, they can get
as good of a view on their computer, and so forth. That's like saying
that you aren't interested in sunsets because you aren't interested in
science, you aren't interested in live concerts because the sound is
better on your home stereo, or you aren't interested in sex because you
don't want to have children.
The experience was incredible, and I can see how it could become
addictive. There was so much to experience that trying to make sure I
didn't miss one thing meant that I missed something else.
Considering how far off the predictions of apoceclipse were, a
tremendous number of people completely blew an incredible opportunity.
Our camp was so overprepared we could have basically just restocked on
water and gone off to that thing in the desert for two weeks. My
impression of Prineville was that it was about the size of Mitchell,
with maybe a small grocery, a gas station etc. rather than a good sized
town with several decent restaurants, full sized grocery stores etc.
I went into the eclipse with the understanding that no matter how good
of photos I took, I could not take as good of photos as someone with
better gear, up to and including the hubble.
There was a lot of preparation I meant to do, but didn't get around to
because I was dealing with other things, and not having done that caused
me to miss parts of the experience, but even 70% of the experience is
still life changing.
I made some crucial mistakes with my photography.
1) I should have had everything set up completely automatically so that
once the eclipse started, I could just push a button and have things go,
leaving me free to pay more attention to the world around me.
2) I didn't make sure that my sensors were clean and there was a huge
dust spot on the camera I set up to shoot the sun.
3) I used the same camera for shooting the partial phase and the
complete phase. Not taking the solar filter off soon enough and putting
it back on too soon caused me to miss crucial shots.
4) I didn't set up a better equatorial mount system, even if it was just
a "barn door" with a manually cranked bolt. As such, I also didn't have
as good of tripod heads as I should have.
5) I didn't bracket my shots of the eclipse itself. I actually just left
the exposure the same as it was with the solar filter which got me some
nice details, but missed a lot of the corona.
6) I worried too much about the partial phase of the eclipse, and while
those photos are cool in some ways, they just don't compare to totality,
and sucked a bunch of energy that could have been better spent on other
things.
7) It didn't register just how dark things get just before the eclipse,
and I should have had a faster lens on the camera I was trying to shoot
my surroundings with.
I have learned from my experience and sincerely hope to have the chance
to put what I've learned to use when seeing more eclipses in the future.
One of the hazards for an eclipse that I was long aware of is clouds.
Despite the coast being incredibly convenient (since I have places to
stay there), I figured that the probability of skies not only being
clear at 1020, but staying clear as the shadow cools the humid air, to
be fairly remote. A few months ago I met someone involved with an
intentional community, which turned out to be southeast of Bend and
Madras (Eagle's Rest Ranch you can find the public group, and see some
of my photos). I was able to secure four nights there for a reasonable
cost. Our trip up Friday didn't run into too much traffic, but the fire
outside of Sisters oregon was rather worrisome (though I did get some
cool photos at Roberts field). The campsite was about equidistant
between Madras and Mitchell, both pretty much on center of the path of
totality. Saturday we went on a recon run out to Mitchell, and scoped
out several locations. This was one of the best decisions I made,
because that gave us Plans A, B and C for the eclipse.
We got to our Plan A location, then ended up moving about half a mile
down the road to what I think ended up being a better location. When we
were driving there we spent a lot of time under the smoke plume from the
Sisters fire, plus there were some threatening high clouds. One of my
travelmates was shitting little bricks with sharp corners, but I
insisted that there was no place else that had an overall higher
probability of good viewing, and that we still had at least an hour
before we had to move to get to another location. During that hour it
became obvious that where we were was going to clear up, and several of
the other places we were thinking of were not going to be any better.
The run up to the eclipse was interesting. I've seen several partials
before, and even noticed the dimmer light. I entertained myself working
on getting a timelapse sequence as best I could of the partial. The
solar eclipse timer app kept announcing various details, many of which
weren't terribly useful (notice that it's getting colder). Once the
light dropped down to about 10% of nominal (based on the sunny 16 rule)
was when things got really interesting.
Things went from happening slowly and being almost boring, to happening
increasingly faster, with more and more things to see and notice all of
the time. Traffic went from rather busy for hwy 26, to non-existent. We
were within shouting distance from where we were going to watch ( just
before the 55 milepost) where there were a lot of people, and when
things started happening we heard all sorts of shouting and noise from
there. I appreciate their enthusiasm, but it didn't entirely enhance my
experience.
My photographic plans were to concentrate on getting a couple of cool
artistic photos during the totality, and I nearly forgot. It also seems
like I turned off the autofocus switch, or something, because most of
the few I took ended up being out of focus. Oops.
The return to normalcy after the eclipse seemed a lot faster and less
interesting than losing the sun, though the wait for the partial to end
did seem to take quite a while. It was interesting watching the traffic
rate, as different groups seemed to leave Mitchell at different times.
We had thought about going hiking in the painted hills (up 207?) but
gazillions of people had been camping there, so the traffic at 207 and
26 was hellacious. We wandered into Mitchell, grabbed some tacos at an
impromptu taco stand, then headed back. We were making great progress,
until we got caught in the backup from the music festival feeding onto
26. I was needing to stop for a bio-break when we saw a vanagon in a
pullout with steam coming from the radiator so we stopped to help them.
We had thought about heading back Monday night, but with the traffic
delays decided to stay the night at the campsite and head out Tuesday
morning.
One of the things that blew my mind was camping in a rough campground,
on the edge of BLM land, with no services (power, water), but excellent
cell phone reception with LTE data.
--
Larry Colen [email protected] (postbox on min4est) http://red4est.com/lrc
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