Crescent Sun

With the predominantly cloudy weather of late, I missed the Quadrantid meteor shower, despite staying up until after 3.00am this morning. So, after only 4 hours sleep, I amazed myself by waking in time to try and catch the partial solar eclipse. Venus blazed away in the South as I peeped through the curtains, which shocked me into hurriedly getting dressed and collecting my camera gear.

I wasn't sure what time the sun would manage to creep over Shearhatch Wood, so was lucky to arrive just before it showed it's face. The hazy clouds near the horizon made for patchy viewing, but I think gave the scene a little more atmosphere. These are a few of the images I managed to take before the sun disappeared permanently behind the growing cloud. I think I was lucky to see it at all!

Images taken with DSLR at 420mm through Baader solar-film.

Sunrise over Shearhatch - 08.26 UT

08.33 UT

08.36 UT

08.52 UT

Solar Eclipse. 22 July 2009

I consider myself fortunate. My company has a facility in Hangzhou, China, and my work involves occasional trips out to this part of the world. Imagine how I felt when I discovered that the center line of the eclipse passed right over our company. I needed to do some planning!
After a little gentle persuasion I was pleased when my boss agreed it was important that we had a business visit to coincide with the eclipse!

The morning of the eclipse arrived and, to my horror, there was total cloud cover. We were due to leave Hangzhou that afternoon to make another business visit to a facility in Tokyo, so I started to pack, resigned to the fact that I wouldn't see it. I happened to glance out of the window right at the start of the partial phase and, to my amazement, I could see the sun peeping out through high hazy cloud.  I dropped everything to collect my camera gear and rushed down from the 10th floor of the hotel, hardly believing my luck

I set up my camera on the lawn outside the hotel in the sticky heat, complete with 500mm lens and DIY filter made from Baader solar film. As the morning passed, the crowd of onlookers grew; all keen to view the disappearing solar disk through my camera and the hand-held viewer I'd made from some left-over film. This was a little concerning, with fears of my tripod disappearing amongst the crowd, and the risk of my new buddies removing the filter and damaging their eyes. Fortunately, everyone was very orderly and I was, for a time, the centre of attention, trying to explain what was going on through the medium of sign language!


World Trade Centre, Hangzhou



Totality approaches!



These are a collection of images of what we saw.

Partial phases were taken using the solar filter. A few seconds before totality, I removed the filter and programmed the camera to take images automatically every second through second contact, to try and capture the diamond ring and Bailey's beads. I did the same at third contact, before putting the filter back for further partial phase shots.

An amazing experience and I can't wait for the next one.



Second contact diamond ring



Bailey's beads





Totality


  


Beautiful!



Chromosphere and prominance