Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Full Totality Solar Eclipse Destinations

I was surprised at the temperature change, wasn't expecting that much difference.

No kidding. my first one was in Colombia in 1995 or so. It was in their hot season and I was at 10 deg latitude. HOT and very strong sun rays. Went from this to cool in a matter of a second when the last bit of sun finally got occluded. And then 4 minutes of dark glorious cool and then as soon as the first diamond like light beam blasted out of the side of moon, the temp just skyrocketed.

A partial eclipse is a world away from a full eclipse, not even close, all the way until the moment the sun is completely blocked.

School is in session where I’m at that day. Absentee rates, among both staff and students will be astronomical (and should be). I’ve been encouraging everyone who can get to an area of totality to go but for many kids it ain’t that easy.

IIRC Lackland AFB on the West Side will get nine seconds of totality. A ten minute drive away and you’re at a full minute, a bit past that 90 seconds. That’s how local the edge of that round shadow of full totality is.

The only partial eclipse I’m sorry I missed IIRC was around May of maybe 2013. Partial eclipse, I didn’t even bother to step outside. I should have done, I didn’t realize the sun was gonna set in partial eclipse, that was spectacular, like a multi-planet system from science fiction.

All I had to do was step outside.

Be working 23 floors up right in the path. Should be pretty neat

We had 99.1 on the eclipse several years ago and it was fantastic. I surely wouldn't complain about 99.9

Backyard should be 99.8.

I'm dead center in the path. It is supposed to last 4 minutes or so. I'm betting it will be cloudy but the family will come over for a cookout and party.

Yes! Do get to the centerline if possible. A 90% view is nothing like a 100% scene. Damned near a religious experience and something one's kids and you will never forget. For sure though, do run down some glasses or filters that allow for safe direct viewing.

The image below is a composite (beginning to end going left to right) Cookie assembled from our Aug 2017 event here in Oregon. She used a homemade mylar filter I put together for the earliest and later stages, as there is enough light intensity then to fry one's camera sensors. The mylar blocks about 99.9% of the incoming light, so one gets a color shift. When one reaches the diamond ring - totality - diamond ring phases, it's safe to remove the filter and acquire the white light images. Then one has to go back to the filter.



For posting purposes and image assembly, these snapshots are heavily downsized. At full resolution, one can see small black sunspots on the original shots. It's interesting to observe those spots over time, as they move across the sun's surface and out of sight at different speeds. She did these shots with a Canon EOS 70D wearing a Canon 500mm prime lens. I can't recall the settings but do remember she simply went with what the camera's metering system suggested.

I made some attempts with another camera (EOS 50 D) and 100-400mm Canon zoom, but they came out poorly and were round filed.