I didn't intend to take a lot of quality photos during the 2024 solar eclipse, for one simple reason: Lots of people would get much better pictures, so why worry?
At the entrance to Summit Lake State Park, which is--I don't know--in Central Indiana somewhere, we saw a car that advertised an owner who was really serious about the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence. I'll bet that entire luggage rack held camera equipment.
We parked right beside a guy who told us he drove here from Colorado, after first planning to see the eclipse in Texas. His instincts were right on: He barely missed hurricane force winds in his home state, and avoided driving into rainstorms down south. Above is his telescope/camera, which took a time lapse of the eclipse and set him back about five thousand bucks.
The cost of my camera? Well, take off a zero, for starters.
Then there was the family that set up on the other side of us:
I don't know where they were from, but they were also very nice folk who, despite having kids, clearly didn't lack spending money.
I experimented, and managed to get this photo pre-totality, by putting eclipse glasses over the lens. This worked only when I forgot to turn off the flash, for which I have no explanation.
I told you all that to explain why I'm very proud of this last photo. No, it's nowhere good as the more experienced photographers with more expensive setups, but honestly, I didn't expect to get this at all:
It wasn't about getting photos, not for us. It was about experiencing it. After seeing the one in 2017, we knew that if we got lucky and the weather broke out way, we were in for an unforgettable experience. We were right. Totality worth it.
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Remember: The sky above is full of all sorts of amazing things, and only a few of them can hurt you.