We only had to drive 45 minutes to my mom's house for 100%. Well worth it for that extra. 5% visible from our house IMHO. I would travel far to see another. My kids enjoyed it. Next time I will get to some high ground. Renting a hot air balloon might be the ticket. :)

It was easily the coolest astronomic event I have seen. Much cooler than comets, meteor showers, lunar eclipses, etc.

Wife and I were at a local fish house, and the employee's kept running outside to look.

One let me try his "glasses" to see, and not to surprising to me, I couldn't see a thing with them on.

Wife looked and told me how much of the sun was covered. Apparently an awful lot, since she said there was only a portion above the moon that was visible.

As to why I couldn't see anything: I am now 90+ % blind in one eye, which makes it hard enough to see, but then my irises don't open like most do, due to the this silly disease. I would have had to stand there for maybe 10 minutes before I could have seen anything. I drive into a tunnel, I am totally blind. Have to stop and wait to be able to see (have had some scary events)..

Such is live. I did have a great lunch, and the temps went down quite a bit...:-)

Approaching 100% there was a developing twilight, but it did not seem like a evening twilight because the colors did not turn red and shadows were at the wrong angle. The light took on a gray cast. At the instant it reached 100%, there was a sudden darkening, a few stars were visible, but it was not a nighttime dark. Lots of ambient light sensors were confused. Things can't appear absolutely dark because the shadow of totality is basically a point at ground level, while some light diffuses in from side areas that are still fully lit. Another aspect is that our vision system is not equipped for instant darkness accommodation. Depending on your exact location, there could have been some fully illuminated nearby clouds. One nearby observer remarked that, as totally approached, his camera case was not as hot as it had been earlier. I didn't measure any temperatures, but it seemed much cooler because less light reached my body.

Great show! If you missed this one, although it will not be quite as spectacular, the next big show will be in 2024 -- start checking the long range weather forecast, pick your location, and make reservations now.

Edit: There is a certain amount of "the luck of the draw" with respect to weather. And, this can vary almost block by block. At my viewing location the history of cloud cover was not grand, but I took the risk -- and it paid off handsomely. The location was nearly cloud free. During the early stages of the eclipse there were a few wispy clouds passing rapidly over the sun, but they were small and not very disruptive. Afterward, I spoke to an individual observing from a few miles away and a passing cloud blocked his view of totality.

Actually, the Eclipse in 2024 will be even better because totality will last for up to 7 minutes is some areas!

First, they make lens filters in many colors and a polarizing filter would have been perfect for this application- it would reduce the light entering, which would have given the iris a chance to remain open as the Moon passed in front of the Sun. f22 isn't the smallest aperture available, f32 is still fairly common and the link below shows one of them. Older cameras had f64.

Have you ever seen the manual for a camera? It specifically states that looking into the viewfinder while focusing on the Sun will damage the light sensor. Or that reason, photographers who shoot photos of the Sun use a filter that blocks the UV and IR, as well as much of the light that will only cause the film/CCD to overload. Film has a limited range of light levels and CCDs can be damaged when they receive too much light- they can't deal with the brightness either, even if they do have a wider dynamic range. Closing the iris will make proper focus more likely, but it still won't prevent blindness if someone looks into the viewfinder. Also, even a 'pinhole' camera needed an aperture that would focus at the film plane and poking just any size hole in a random box doesn't work because the ratio of the height/distance to the object is directly related to the height/distance from the lens to the image. At this distance, the image size in a fixed focus pinhole camera with shallow depth would be incredibly small.

The "glasses" that were sold/distributed for looking at the Sun made it possible to look directly at it- why does this fact evade you? Have you ever seen photos or video of photographers who make images of the Sun? They either use some kind of sheet to filter the light (silver or gold mylar work well) or they can use a solar filter, made specifically for shooting eclipses.

Filter-
[Link: bhphotovideo.com]

Lens-
[Link: bestbuy.com]

WRT compressors and limiters, of course an external device won't affect the way someone's ears work (unless that device is fitted into the ear and blocks the sound entering in order to process it and make some kind of change to the dynamic range). Compressors raise the minimum level and lower the upper limit- yes, they can do something similar to what you wrote was necessary for the camera.

You could have used google to find this info.

Thanks for this.


Actually, it's pointing the camera at the sun, not looking into the viewfinder, that can cause damage.

DOH!

Should have re-read it before I posted that one.

I drove to Greer SC for the totality. It was the quickest 2 minutes in my life. And so worth it. Going to go to Mexico in 2024, because Erie in April or Mexico. Plus Margaritas.

I only got 65% coverage but I used a welding visor for my filter not the little glasses. I happen to be going to my little bank branch during the peak and I asked my teller, she knows me, if she had some glasses. She did not so she downplayed it a bit. I told her I had a welding glass and she could look through it if she wanted. She did and so did all the other bank employees who work there, I think it was 6 in all. They all thought it was really cool and they were all very thankful I shared. I have heard so many stories about sharing glasses and impromptu groups developing and enjoying a shared experience.

I drove down to Salem Oregon for the total eclipse. Took over four hours to get down, and nearly 7 hours to come back :(. But it was an amazing experience and I got some good shots.



This was shot with my Canon 5D Mark iv, 600mm lens, ISO 800, F4, 1/60 sec (on big tripod).

Nice!

Great photo, Amir.

Thanks guys.

Nice picture. We were working but came outside to look. Had a welder's mask to look through and that worked out perfect. Tried to take a picture though it with my Sony pint and shoot but it did not come out as good as hoped. Definitely not as nice as Amirm's photo. It wasn't a total eclipse here maybe 70%.

A bit disappointing up here (Montreal Canada) but 2024 should be interesting