It has taken me ten months and 300 hours of image processing, but I've finally published the images from my Exmouth eclipse expedition. Just in time to be an inspiration for others in North America April 2024, cause I'm not going!
This was a pretty wild approach to eclipse imaging, only possible with the support of equipment sponsors:
- Three six-inch and one four-inch Sky-Watcher refractors is a lot of glass to deliver maximum light and resolution to the cameras.
- Capturing more than a thousand 8K video frames at the full sensor resolution of two Sony a1 cameras provides a lot of data for the enhancement steps, even helping counteract the atmospheric ‘seeing’ at such long focal lengths.
- Four telescope and camera combinations allowed each camera to be dedicated to one primary exposure, allowing even the wider stills cameras to simply burst at a fixed shutter speed, gathering hundreds of exposures in well under 50 seconds (allowing for longer exposures around 2nd and 3rd contacts).
- The two main scopes were carried on my Sky-Watcher EQ8-Rh mount with high-resolution encoders. This meant no periodic error during 50 seconds of totality and facilitated accurate alignment and integration of the video frames.
Full story with more images:
https://philhart.com/exmouth-eclipse
Three other important thanks to note:
- Diego and Paul at Sidereal Trading
- Brett, Jasmine and Riley in Exmouth
- Colin Legg for collaboration and inspiration on the processing journey
Thanks!
Enjoy - Phil