Solar Eclipse

[Horus]

I was up and about this morning and as usual sitting at my PC with the TV on and listening to the news when I heard them taking about the Solar Eclipse. Listening to them it was apparent that it was not that clear down South, so as the sun was shining outside I went for a look. I have some arc welders dark glass in the garage which is more than adequate for looking at the sun with so had a quick peek through one to see what was visible. I was not disappointed and I could see a very clear eclipse starting to take place, so decided to try for a few images. I did a quick cobble up by taping one of the welders glasses to my UV filter and stuck it back on the camera, but even with that all I could see through the rear LCD screen was a big fuzzy yellow ball. Anyway I set the camera on a ‘sports’ setting to give me a fast shot and set the ISO down to 100 and took pot luck. These are the images I got over about 45 minutes, not all good but it gives you a good idea of how it looked, it was also very noticeable how cold it became as the eclipse reached its maximum coverage for this part of the UK which was around 90%. Unfortunately although it had been really bright and sunny to start with the clouds did arrive as the eclipse was on its way back out again so I could not complete a nice series from start to finish. It did clear a little bit later on but it was hard going to try and get anything other than an unclear shot with the last set of images. From my perspective the Moon eclipsed the Sun by coming in from top right and dipping down until it reached its maximum, it then continued rising up and to the left until it had passed.

Here is a lapse set of shots, not that good, but worth a look.
Forgot to add, as all the shots were taken at varying zoom lengths I have had to manually crop them to fit, so you have to imagine that the disk sizes reamained the same for both the Sun and Moon and did not vary in size as these images may indicate they did.

[Grandad]

You are correct about cloud cover in the south H, didn't see a thing, it just went a bit gloomy for a while. Lucky tou to get some good picture
You were much more fortunate than us and the BBC showed some good shots from Jodrell Bank Observatory.

I don't get excited in any way about eclipses, unlike some of these astronomer types who almost wet their pants in expectation. But I can certainly understand how the ancients used to view such events as the work of the gods or the end of the world.......happilly we are rather better informed now than they were.

[Kiya]

Very good Horus .............I tried but all I got was a very bright ball & lens flare

It did go darker with clouds & cold but soon cleared to bright sunshine again.

[Horus]

I can see the Jodrell Bank Observatory from my living room window .
Kiya, hope you had a dark glass in front of your lens, you can damage your eyes even looking through a camera viewfinder

[Kiya]

Mmmmm no silly me, saying that I did take a bit of a wobble & felt sick but ok after a piece of toast.

[LovelyLadyLux]

Didn't see it at all here. We're up to our tread water eyes in rain and fog.......... Doing nother than enjoying a :cuppa:

[Grandad]

I can see the Jodrell Bank Observatory from my living room window .
Kiya, hope you had a dark glass in front of your lens, you can damage your eyes even looking through a camera viewfinder

I thought the Observatory would not be too far from you Horus but didn't guess you could see it from your home.

OMG yes! I remember getting a sunset shot from the roof of the hotel in Luxor, with the Nikon eyelevel finder. Although the sun was right on the horizon and fairly low strength, I still had a black shadow in my eye for a couple of days after. I thought I had done some serious damage and, for all I know, I possibly did.

Even the EVF in bridge cameras will have a very bright image, not to mention of course, the damage you might do to the sensor.

A timely warning today I think.

[Jayway]

Didnt see anything here, was too busy playing my new RollerCoaster Tycoon game - some of the new games (Gold Edition) on this dvd, well, you would need an engineering degree to work out where you can build. There is no killing on this game, apart from when I forget to maintain the coasters and they crash - little dead people --

[Kiya]

Nope I did everything I shouldn't have, at my age you'd think I'd know better

On saying that I did see a an older gentleman on telly with no protective glasses & didn't notice anything at the end of his camera lens.

[Horus]

On saying that I did see a an older gentleman on telly with no protective glasses & didn't notice anything at the end of his camera lens.

Nevertheless it is still highly dangerous and WILL seriously damage your eyes, you have been lucky. Think of it like this, the lens is acting like a magnifying glass and can focus the light onto your retina and blind you, never ever look at the sun through a camera, a telescope or binoculars.

@Jay, you certainly love playing your games by the way, has Glory settled back in now?

[Jayway]

Yes thankyou Horus . . had 4 days of rodeo and me hanging onto her mane but now she is civilised again and we were going out daily ... these days of rain have stopped me, the asthma kicks in and I dont believes in sucking on puffers too much. It is supposed (yeah) to be nice tomorrow so we can go on our village ride and have a good nose around . . traffic is less Sundays. Fussy hens have stopped laying after the first rain . HUH.

[Horus]

Sounds lovely Jay