Doaktown, New Brunswick, Canada
I'm still mentally processing the experience. Imagine the size of a typical full moon in the sky and that is the diameter of a total eclipse. The sky is twilight dark in all directions and yet the dancing ring around the black moon is impossibly bright. I was occupied with cameras at the start of totality however as the moon began to move away from the maximum the ground rippled with fast-moving grey shimmering light, known as "shadow bands". They heralded the returning sunshine and like a flock of birds rushing overhead, they were suddenly gone as normal brightness washed over the landscape.
Having practiced eclipse photography back in October for the annular and also through extensive research on reference websites like Eclipsophile and Mr. Eclipse, I'm highly satisfied with the images of the day.
I ran two cameras simultaneously:
Canon EOS 60D
Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 telephoto lens
Thousand Oaks Optical threaded solar filter
iOptron SkyGuider Pro
Non-totality camera settings:
ISO 1600; f/11; 1/400th second; 400mm
Bracketing set to three shots (-1/3EV to +1/3 EV)
Interval of one series of bracketed photos every 5 minutes
Totality camera settings:
ISO 1600*; f/11; 1/60th second; 400mm
Bracketing set to 7 shots (-2EV to +2EV)
Interval of one series of bracketed photos every 5 seconds
*ISO was supposed to be 200 but I missed changing it when I was scrambling
Canon EOS 6D Mark II
Canon 17-40mm USM lens
Thousand Oaks solar filter film secured with a rubber band (a very fussy configuration that I'm going to find an alternative for in the future)
Tripod - no tracking
Non-totality camera settings:
ISO 1600; f/11; 1/100th second; 17mm, focused to infinity
Bracketing set to three shots (-1/3EV to +1/3EV)
Interval of one series of bracketed photos every 5 minutes
Totality camera settings
ISO 200; f/11; 1/60th second; 17mm, focused to infinity
Bracketing set to 7 shots (-2EV to +2EV)
Interval of one series of bracketed photos every 5 seconds
The most difficult part was figuring out the framing for the wide-angle
time lapse. I did not have a chance to really scout out the area until
an hour before the eclipse began, and most of that time was spent doing a
rough polar alignment of the tracker for telephoto shooting. In the
end I decided that getting as close to the river edge as possible was
probably my best prospect. I would have liked to have shot 24mm but I
wasn't feeling very confident with the composition.
In order to maximize my actual viewing time of the event, I stopped taking non-totality pictures when it was 5 minutes away. During this buffer time I removed the solar filters while blocking the camera with my body so that I would not risk burning the sensors. I put the lens caps on each camera and then switched each camera's settings over to "totality mode". When the eclipse was a minute away from totality I hit "go" on both cameras and they began to rapid-fire bracketed sequences. When the countdown was at the final 20 seconds I removed each lens cap and enjoyed the show. When there was about 30 second left I stopped the cameras and put the lens caps back on. I knew that this was going to reduce the chances of capturing features like Baily's Beads and the Diamond Ring, as I was shooting those critical bits only at the start of totality and not also the end...but you know this was such a special event I decided that I was gonna get what I get and be ok with it. Turns out I was lucky anyway!
When totality was over I did the reverse: I blocked the cameras with my shadow while I affixed the solar filters, returned the cameras' settings to non-totality mode, and resumed taking a burst of photos every 5 minutes until the very end.
One of my very favorite astrophotographers, Alyn Wallace, recently passed away from health complications and I could not help but think his spirit was out there in the universe somewhere, cheering on the eclipse. His YouTube video on photographing the eclipse over Chile in 2019 was one of the resources I leaned on the most and he was absolutely right: the time to figure out your camera settings is not during the eclipse. The more that you can prepare in advance, the easier a time you'll have. Other than when I was flipping camera settings between non-totality and totality, it was a pretty chill operation. I did myself the favor of writing down all of the settings in a notebook so that if my brain went into blind panic mode I would have all of the settings right there. Other than missing the telephoto ISO setting it worked out pretty well!