It was a personal goal to photograph both the annular solar eclipse in October 2023 and the total solar eclipse in April 2024, which have been collectively referred to as the Great American Eclipse. I quickly found out that “eclipse chasing” is an exciting, often nail-biting, adventure. It was an incredible learning experience, and I was able to participate in a collective experience shared by millions of people! Everyone who saw the eclipse has a story to tell. Here is my story about how I photographed Part 2 of the Great American Eclipse! After successfully photographing the annual eclipse over the Bisti Badlands of New Mexico (which I call Part 1), I immediately began researching and planning for the total solar eclipse (Part 2). Guiding my efforts were two ebooks that provided invaluable information for shooting the annular and total solar eclipses. They will need to be updated for future eclipses, but I highly recommend them both!
The path of totality for the 2024 total solar eclipse started in Texas, and proceeded northeast throughout parts of Arkansas, Missouri, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. A big question was “where should I go to view the eclipse?”
Historical climate data suggested that the further south you went, the better your chances of having clear skies for this eclipse. Unfortunately, airfares and hotel for Texas and Arkansas were extremely expensive, especially for an event that may not be visible due to weather. We decided to drive to the closest area from Virginia (our home) that was in the path of totality. For us, this meant Cleveland – which became “Plan A”. Cloud cover for areas around Cleveland and further north were edging up into the 60% range for the month of April. We knew the historical climate data was not in our favor, but we rolled the dice. Two days before the eclipse, we packed the car and hit the road, determined to try our luck.
As you can see from the graphic above, Cleveland is not where we ended up photographing the eclipse. A tool I used to track and predict cloud cover forecasts was an app named Windy. The Windy app has the ability to access multiple weather models, and predict not only overall cloud cover, but also show forecasts for high, medium, and low-level clouds. This is important, as you can usually observe a total solar eclipse through high level clouds, but medium and low-level clouds could absolutely ruin your day. For the purposes of photographing the eclipse, your preferred site is one that is clear with as few high level clouds as possible. This means you need to be mobile and ready to “chase the eclipse” to a place with clear skies. As the day of the eclipse rolled around, the forecasts for the Cleveland area looked very “iffy”. It showed overcast skies passing through and giving way to high level clouds by mid-day. The timing would be critical as the eclipse was at 3:10 pm. If the clouds did not clear out as quickly as anticipated, it could be very poor conditions for photographing the eclipse.
The Windy app showed increasing high level clouds over Cleveland and western Ohio for the eclipse, but it was predicting a mostly clear area to the east of Indianapolis near the Ohio/Indiana border. We made a “game time” decision on the morning of the eclipse to leave Cleveland and drive toward Indianapolis, with our “Plan B” location becoming Richmond, Indiana. This was a 4-hour trip (if we did not run into traffic). We were a bit nervous about driving such a long distance on the day of the eclipse. We made sure to stay within the path of totality all the way down, in case we ended up getting stranded by traffic somewhere that would become “Plan C”. As luck would have it, we did not hit any traffic, and we made it to Richmond at 1 pm, giving us a couple hours to find a location and set up before the start of totality. We did check cloud conditions along the way. While western Ohio was clear as we passed through, the models showed increasing clouds there for the eclipse. We made the leap of faith to continue on in hopes of promising conditions further south. Happily, things worked out as predicted. We did indeed end up in a “hole” for the high-level clouds at our Plan B site. Plan B generally had clearer skies than Plan A! The take-away here is that having an app like “Windy” can help an eclipse-chaser thread the needle when necessary!
We had absolutely no idea where to go in the Richmond area to view the eclipse. It occurred to me as we were driving that a Rest Stop area, if on the south side of the I-70 highway (the eclipse would be in the southern sky), would make an easily accessed, no hassles, free location with nearby parking and restrooms. The “Ohio Welcome Center” a few miles east of Richmond became the official “Plan B” location. We parked and set up camp about fifty feet away in a grassy area. There was a small crowd of about 50-75 people present who had the same idea. It worked perfectly!
I set up a mirrorless Canon R5 with a 100-500 mm lens and a 1.4x teleconverter on a gimbal head to capture close-up images. With the teleconverter, it allowed for focal lengths extending out to 700 mm. I ended up using a focal length of 560 mm. While I could have zoomed in more and made the eclipse larger in the frame, I wanted the field of view to remain wide enough that the camera would not need to be repositioned as the eclipse moved in the sky during totality. The 560 mm focal length worked well for this.
I followed the guidance in Gorden Telepun’s ebook on how to plan for your exposure settings during the different phases of the eclipse. My settings for the sun’s disc using my solar filter at the 560 mm was ISO 100, f9, and 1/800 second. I used these settings for the partial eclipse phases and also as the starting point for photographing the inner corona during totality. During totality, I took a series of images at different slower shutter speeds to capture more of the outer corona. For the diamond ring and Bailey’s Beads, I experimented with a range of settings from 1/6400 to 1/2000 of a second.
On a second tripod, I set up a Canon R6 Mk II with a 15-35 mm lens set to 28 mm. I wanted a wide-angle image that would capture the twilight sky and sunset colors on the horizon, showing how the overall scene looked to my eye during totality. For the wide angle shot, I framed up some tree silhouettes under the predicted location of the eclipse. I focused on the horizon and made my best guess at exposure settings. I then put the lens cap back on to protect the camera sensor until totality. The last thing to do was setting up the “Solar Eclipse Timer” app. This amazing app was developed by Gordon Telepun, and provides an audio countdown using your smartphone’s speaker for each important phase of the eclipse. This is critical to ensure you are ready to capture the diamond ring and bailey’s beads during C2 and C3. Bailey’s beads only last for a second or two, so timing these images is extremely important. To use the app, you purchase and preload the eclipse data into your smartphone ($10). Once you are at your final shooting location, you load your GPS coordinates into the app using your smartphone’s GPS receiver. The app then calculates the exact start times for C2 and C3. Once you begin the timer function, the app will give you audio alerts at key moments during the eclipse. It announces when you have 30 seconds before C2. This is when you remove your solar filter and begin shooting a rapid burst of images to capture the diamond ring and Bailey’s beads. It announces when you are half-way through totality, allowing you time to readjust your settings for C3 and the second occurrence of Bailey’s beads and a diamond ring. The app’s audio alerts take nearly all the stress and guess work out of timing your images. It worked very well, and can be used for any solar eclipse.
You always hear people say a total solar eclipse is something you have to experience to really understand. I would tend to agree. Seeing day turn into twilight while the sun becomes a dark hole in the sky, surrounded by a brilliant white, pulsating corona is an emotional event that literally takes your breath away when you see it. Due to the limitations of camera sensors, the photos they produce just don’t convey the sense of wonder that comes from seeing it with your own eyes. Here is a composite of two images blended for proper exposure of the corona that approximates how things looked in the sky to my own eyes during totality.
This eclipse had some “bonus” features. Because the sun was at the “solar maximum” of its 11-year cycle, there were a number of red plasma prominences extending out from the chromosphere into the sun’s corona that were visible, both in close-up photos and to the unassisted naked eye. These prominences extend out hundreds of thousands of miles into space. They quickly became some of my favorite features! I have read that prominences were not nearly as visible in the 2017 total solar eclipse. Here are some of my favorite close-up images:
