On October 14 2023 around noon, Texas Time, there will be an annular eclipse of the Sun. In brief, an annular Sun eclipse is one in which the Moon’s apparent diameter is not quite great enough to completely cover the Sun and at the moment of “totality” leaves a visible “ring of fire” around the Sun.
On April 8 2024 around 1pm, Texas Time, there will be a total eclipse of the Sun. A total eclipse of the Sun occurs when the “apparent” diameter of the Moon is great enough to completely cover the Sun and for a few moments, it becomes as dark as nighttime.
If you’ve ever experienced a total eclipse, it is an eerie experience. The abrupt loss of Sunlight causes thermal effects that result in sudden wind activity and any nearby animals react predictably to the onset of night in the middle of the day.
These are visually similar to an eclipse of the Moon in which the shadow when the Earth is between the Moon and the Sun completely covers the full moon.
A pretty crappy photo of an eclipse of the Moon nearing totality. This was shot handheld with an iPhone so I was unable to get a clear shot. Hopefully the camera resulting from this project will be able to do a better job.
I will add posts documenting the hardware/software used in the project and any interesting photos I get. @theeccentricgenius@v205 might be interested.
Along with your high-tech, try the old methods of safely capturing Solar events. I made a pinhole black-out box in an austere location (foil from my streetfood container) to capture Mars' Solar transition and a partial eclipse using a smartphone timer and video, in daylight. Most of my images looked like your Lunar eclipse, but some had good definition.
If I can find them I’ll post photos from the Venus Solar transit back in 2012. I made a crude pinhole camera from a piece of tinfoil taped to a cardboard frame that worked surprisingly well.
Yes! We shared the same sun! : ) With this transit (also in n austere location), I used binoculars turned BACKWARDS under my arm and my body to block some of the direct sunlight. The image was terrible, but it was double (bi-nocular) and good enough to see the black dot move inside the white dot on a concrete slab. Minds were blown (mine, too!).
We've got land near Russellville AR up on top of a mountain. We should have a great vantage point for the total eclipse from there. We're supposed to get more than 4 minutes of totality.
I've been looking around for someone doing something like this. I saw the one in 2017 from just south of St. Louis and I've been disappointed that I didn't get pictures or measurements of any kind.
And on an another eclipse (2017?) I used a 2-meter long, 15cm diameter tube without optics or foil (the long tube helps select more parallel rays, but gets internal reflections). VERY poor quality, but if you knew what to see, you saw it.
You know, I think some of the most fun I’ve had with astronomy projects is from using as little technology as possible. I find you can get too caught up in fiddling with the tech and miss out on some of the experience.
My father had all the gadgets that lower-middle-class could afford (az/el followers, 35mm SLR, welder's glass, visits to Palomar), but always was the case after a beautiful, clear week in Cap-Chat on the St. Lawrence ('72), that clouds would roll in at the wrong time, and all the biggest, newest gadgets were the first to be packed up. That's when he dragged out the craft supplies and went low tech. I used my father's show-and-tell in my decades of work in bleak areas that brought smiles to all at natural wonders occurring outside our world. These "aha" moments still get me. Free shows.
My parents were both non-technologically inclined but encouraged my interests with things like chemistry sets and a Things of Science subscription.
We lived out in the country and I was fascinated from an early age with the night sky as you could actually see the Milky Way then. Nowadays we’re at the mercy of light pollution and about the only good night view I get is when I go out to the McDonald Observatory.
The lens gives pretty sharp images for daylight terrestrial shots. I’ve yet to get any shots of the Sun as I have to rig up a way to take it all outside where I can point it at different parts of the sky. I hope to do that this weekend. Had a simple hernia repair yesterday an I’m kind of sore today.
