Thanks for the nice comments everyone, they helped restore my confidence after a series of quite comical errors from hasty planning!
Here’s a list of what I forgot:
- Ball & Socket head for camera wide fields so that I could orient the camera correctly.
- Bubble level for levelling the tripod so I could index it with my polar aligned position at home. Fortunately, Mitre 10 at Bribie Island had a small unit in stock – phew!
- Wooden pads for the tripod feet to prevent it sinking into the sand.
Other lessons learned:
- Don’t spring last minute surprises when on a family outing. It might work the 1st time around, but it is far better to negotiate any modifications to the itinerary up front!
- Remove the UV block filter from the lens to minimise ghosting (thanks Paul!).
- Use your planetarium program to predict the horizon position of future events. Allow for the movement of Sun/Moon rise/set positions along the horizon between the Solstices and Equinoxes.
- Wear an all over body net to thwart the blood thirsty ravages of Bribie mosquitoes and sand flies.
- Update the polar alignment xls spreadsheet on my PDA to assist with indexing the polar alignment reticule once darkness has set in.
- Have a running sheet which lists the type of shots you want and the equipment used for each configuration. It is much easier thinking of this in the peace and quiet of one’s study rather than on a strange beach, in the dark whilst being sucked dry by the local savages.
So, as you can see, a bit of luck was required to get the shot, not to mention the blood transfusion needed the next morning to replace what the thirsty critters drank.
Oh, and one final lesson – when all your planning and efforts fail, just enjoy the beautiful, visual spectacle!
Cheers
Dennis