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Old 08-20-2017, 01:31 PM   #64
Karl_Mcknight
Tomorrow (Monday 8/21/17) at about 1:30 pm local time (Nashville Tn/ Central Time zone) we will experience a Total Eclipse of the Sun. I will be at work when this happens, but I will be carrying my camera with me as well as some mylar sheets for filtering. I will have various things at my disposal, including a makeshift solar projector. Hopefully if all goes well, I will have some projected images of the sun as well as actual images of the sun, before blackout, during blackout, and post blackout. We are only supposed to have about 2 minutes of Totality here in my location so I'll have to be set up ahead of time and work fast. If I'm lucky, I'll have some pictures to post here in a day or so.

I did some practice shots with the mylar sheeting over a lens, and 2 sheets worked really well. I was able to play with my settings and get some ideas of what I will need to do.

When in automatic mode, a digital camera "Wants to Expose" correctly, and of course you can't do that and get good pictures when aiming directly at the sun.

But when in Manual mode, with 2 sheets of Mylar, I was able to set my ISO to 200, my Focal to F22, and with a shutter speed of 1/500th of a second had some decent shots.

Of course this could vary tomorrow depending on sun angle, clouds or no clouds, and whether I continue to use 2 sheets of mylar or I may have to go to 3 if it's too bright.

And of course when doing this (I / You / Nobody), should ever look at the sun with their unprotected eyes, never aim a digital camera at the sun without some filtering media, and never look through a camera or telescope at the sun without proper filtering media.