So yesterday was eclipse day, well partial. I had a bash and would struggle to agree that I was successful. Has anyone done any eclipse photography and had any success?
Here is some of what I did and what concerns I had whilst doing it.
My fist concern was burning holes in the cameras CCD in the way that lasers sometimes do. However, working through it logically (not always the best way I will agree!) I decided that it wasn't a problem, as I, like many of us have taken images directly into the sun, backlighting objects etc etc without hassle. If anything, there should be less light during an eclipse.
I was also concerned about going blind. So I used some coloured theatre light filter paper to 'see' and to focus. I shot manually and bracketed heavily.
I also tried shooting through a red cokin filter (red 'cos it was all I had) with the intention of using photoshop to do a colour replacement, perhaps a de saturation.
By combining the above (bracketing and colour replacement) I hoped to merge a few images, HDR maybe. Didn't work too well.
Most importantly I didn't (don't!) have a long lens, or any fancy equipment so needed to try something that steered away from the usual orb and shadow filling the frame. Again I was hoping to blend (or double expose) a few frames. Thinking about it I realised it would be near impossible to achieve a visible foreground type image, as, in order to see the eclipse you need to under expose dramatically, thus rendering the foreground black and nonexistent (dah!) So I opted for a clean foreground that would work as a (faint) silhouette. As there was some cloud early on in the eclipse I used the opportunity to incorporate the haze as a natural 'filter' and ended up with the image I have posted here. By any standards it is not the most interesting of images and is annoyingly moon-like. Anyway, any input or experiences would be welcomed.
Here are the tech details: f/22 at 1/250th. Lens - 17 to 40mm at 40mm (Don't even think about saying that the sun should be bigger!) P/shop: mask on the building to lighten it a bit and a saturation of the blues for the sky.
Paul.
2 comments:
Wow, Paul, this is awesome! I really like this shot. Possibly a tad more PS sharpening for the web image, but I'm pretty sure your original is sharp. I've tried to do eclipses before and not succeeded so i'm really impressed with this which is very different to your run of the mill 'orbs' as you say. Fantastic shot mate.
E
So.. the sun should be bigger..
Just kidding. But you're right; I'd have to say from a layman's point of view that if you didn't know this was the eclipse it'd look just like the moon. Only if you've tried to take photo's of the eclipse would you know what a feat it is.
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