Monday, May 21, 2012

Annular Eclipse of 2012

Yesterday we all convened up on the ridge west side of Ananda Village to watch the annular eclipse.  I had researched this a couple weeks ago and more the night before after one of my colleagues at work sent me a link on this eclipse.  Annular eclipse's happen when the moon covers the sun but not 100% which would be a total eclipse.  Last annular eclipse happened in USA in 1998 and next total eclipse in USA is 2017 so this was really special to be able to see this from our home ground.

Barb (my photo buddy) and I talked earlier in week and made plans.  In researching this, I found that a strong neutral density filter (3.0 or 10x) would give the best for around the sun.  What I didn't realize was it would basically black out everything.  I shot about 100 photos at various exposures all of which were too underexposed so didn't get anything except the silhouette, which was cool in itself but my goal had been also to capture the outline of the oak tree in front of where we were positioned.  Oh well.  Another learning experience however I won't get another chance for a long time.

Anyway, it was still a really neat experience to hang out with a lot of people and let them look through the big lens at the live eclipse.  People brought welders glasses to see also and reflectors to watch.  It was really fun and the light was pretty amazing.  

Waiting to photograph the eclipse on ridge at Village
(Thunderclouds over Donner Pass in background)

Partial about 30%

Getting darker

Maximum eclipse from here (about 97%)

Watching eclipse by reflection

Waning Eclipse

Making hand faces while watching reflection of eclipse


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