March 20 2015 Total solar eclipse success

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Image from March 20 total eclipse observed from Spitzbergen Is Norway.

Ambient temp approx -25C

Pentax K5, William Optics M70, Losmandy Starlapse mount

Composite of 14 images 1/4000 - 1/2s

Joe Cali

[rustigsmed (Russell)]

beautiful stuff Joe, well done.

[Paul Haese]

Brilliant Joe. Interesting how the corona has changed shape from the 2012 eclipse. I always marvel at the changes that transpire with the corona.

[Peter Ward]

Fantastic result Joe.

[h0ughy (David)]

well done and what a brilliant result

[jenchris (Jennifer)]

Intimidating thing isn't it?
Beautiful job.

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Thanks very much for all the comments. It was a fantastic if expensive place to visit. The eclipse was the highlight but basically, I wanted to visit an arctic environment so given the choice between Faroes, Svalbard or viewing from a ship or an aircraft, Svalbard was a no brainer for me and my eclipse observing partner Bengt Alfredsson from Sweden.

More images coming soon.

I am pleased with the result but wondering how much better it would have been if I had focussed better. At almost -30C, and only able to wear thin gloves or bare fingers rather than thick mitts to operate the shutter wheel and focussing, the tips of my fingers were freezing up and stinging as the fingertips tips froze solid. I did my best. We only had a 16kg checked luggage and 6kg carry on allocation on the charter flight so equipment was chosen carefully and kept to an absolute minimum. Displays slow down when they get very cold. As such the response of live view had a significant lag making it quite ineffective. This was a technically difficult eclipse. I had three levels of redundancy for power for the cameras and telescope, but I didn't anticipate the display issues.

Paul Haese:
I agree with you about changes in coronal structure. Jay Anderson was giving a talk in Longyearbyen about eclipses. In it he advised people not to bother taking close up images but to take wide field shots. He expressed the opinion that all close ups look the same and you can't tell one eclipse from another. I do like wide field shots (see the next photo I will post.)

I've known Jay for about 10 years and by reputation long before that. I respect Jay's opinion on many things but I strongly disagree with him on a few issues, this being one of them. This was my 11th totality since 1994 covering nearly two solar sunspot cylces and one and a bit saros. Every corona is unique, coronal structure varies with the sunspot cylcle. Sunspot max coronae are more symmetrical, sunspot min have long equatorial streamers and fine polar "brushes." Show me a blind picture of totality that's not too overworked from my total eclipse observational period and I think I can probably identify the particular eclipse from the coronal structure.

Peter Ward: I hope you had luck and caught some of those fantastic aurorae in Tromsø last week.

cheers
Joe

[PeterEde (Peter)]

that's an awesome shot

[RB (Andrew)]

Sensational.

[colinmlegg (Colin)]

Great shot Joe, particularly so given the ridiculous temps you endured. I did a TLE shoot in Canada in 2010 at -15 C and thought that was bad enough ... had to operate a bramping machine for 5 hours on a frozen lake bed (heated with hand warmers to stop the LCD freezing). But -15 is balmy compared to < -20s

[zardos123 (Brad)]

Very nice joe, i luv it. Did you have to heat the k-5 they are rated to -10 but the temps you were at is amazing
brad

[N1 (Mirko)]

Nice one Joe. Beautiful coronal detail. Would have liked to come back to Svalbard for this, but the cost was so prohibitive that flying seemed a no-brainer , even if that meant a less-than perfect platform for taking photos.

Is there a reason why the lunar disk is darker than the sky outside the corona?

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Originally Posted by zardos123

Very nice joe, i luv it. Did you have to heat the k-5 they are rated to -10 but the temps you were at is amazing
brad

No I didn't heat it. I did get response time lag and some false readings on the liquid crystal displays. This meant that live view had a significant lag and wasn't really much use. I eventually gave up and went back to optical focussing. I don't need the LCD displays during totality. I noticed the freezing up and wrong displays but it didn't otherwise affect the camera operation. I warmed 2 Pentax Dli-90 batteries in my pocket and then inserted them in the cameras about 10mins before C2.

The K01 powered by a single internal D-Li-90 battery shot a wide angle time lapse of 770 discrete fisheye frames at 1 frame per 2s over 25 minutes. It was still going strong, I just chose to switch it off at that point.

The K-5 was powered by one internal D-Li-90 battery and 6x AA size, Li Fe S batteries in a battery grip. I shot around 120 frames with the K5 also with juice to spare.

The k-5 has a 5 frame per second, 5 step bracket. I set the interval to 2ev and then bracket using this sequence, I can do this completely by touch without looking at the camera or telescope. So I can visually enjoy the entire eclipse.

Here's the method :

ISO100 70mmf6 refractor

30s - 40s before C2 set camera to 1/4000 remove solar filter

shoot this for diamond ring, prominences and chromosphere
4000
1000
250
60

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After diamond ring

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15

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shift shutter wheel two clicks left sets 1/2000 s

2000
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125
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8

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shift shutter wheel two clicks left sets 1/1000 s
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4

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shift shutter wheel two clicks left sets 1/500s
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shift shutter wheel two clicks left sets 1/250s
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shift shutter wheel two clicks left sets 1/125s
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2s

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reverse the wheel right 10 click steps to 1/4000s
shoot this for diamond ring, prominences and chromosphere
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It sounds complicated but with a little practice it's very very easy and I don't need computers, scripts don't have problems if the location changes at the last minute.

I visually enjoy 100% of every eclipse while getting decent results at every clear eclipse. I first developed it at my first eclipse in 1994. Of course I had a film camera and changed single shutter speed steps back then. The first time using a K10D for a solar eclipse was in 2008. That was when I began using the 5 step bracketing method and have never turned back.

In 2012 I was exhausted from organizing too many people and activities. Almost 4 days without sleep. Even then I got some results, however I used an 8" SCT and with the low sun altitude, this was the wrong instrument to use that day. However I was much too tired to change instruments on the run.

This time we had a 16kg checked/6kg hand luggage. I made the 16kg checked limit but my camera bag was over at 10.5kg inc the 2.5kg OTA. But I decided that I just couldn't carry a computer.

Cheers

Joe

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Originally Posted by N1

Nice one Joe. Beautiful coronal detail. Would have liked to come back to Svalbard for this, but the cost was so prohibitive that flying seemed a no-brainer , even if that meant a less-than perfect platform for taking photos.

Is there a reason why the lunar disk is darker than the sky outside the corona?

First, note that in my earlier reply, I indicated that the decision to go to Svalbard was qualified as a "no-brainer for me." I wasn't taking a swipe at those who like watching from aircraft or ships. Just that this was something that both my observing partner and I both really wanted to do.

It's darker because it's an artifact of the stacking process. The inner corona, prominences and lunar surface in that composite is the 1/4000s exposure hence the moon is black. I did this composite fairly quickly and while sitting between 2 people on the plane flights back from Europe last 2 days. With more time, I might add in the longest exposures on top of the stack to reveal the Earthshine. But this can be very fiddly and time consuming and can involve a lot of fine brushwork on the mask so I'll decide on this later and when I have my graphics tablet available. Have other images to work on first.

cheers

Joe

[N1 (Mirko)]

Originally Posted by OzEclipse

I wasn't taking a swipe at those who like watching from aircraft or ships.

I wasn't suggesting this, apologies if that's how it came across.

Originally Posted by OzEclipse

Yes. It's an artifact of the stacking process. The inner corona, prominences and lunar surface in that composite is the 1/4000s exposure hence the moon is black. I did this composite fairly quickly and while sitting between 2 people on the plane flights back from Europe last 2 days. With more time, I might add in the longest exposures on top of the stack to reveal the Earthshine. But this can be very fiddly and time consuming and can involve a lot of fine brushwork on the mask so I'll decide on this later and when I have my graphics tablet available. Have other images to work on first.

That will be a great image too I'm sure. Look forward to it. I'll try to follow up with some of mine later this week.

[sil (Steve)]

beautiful, very jealous!

[astronobob (Bob)]

Brilliant photography, capturing & processing

NVS

[ChrisM]

Great image Joe - and looking forward to more.

I can vouch for the cold temperatures of at least -25 deg C: my bottle of water froze solid in thick down coat pocket, although I do concede that there were 5 layers of clothing under the coat. The difficulty taking photos in those temperatures is not to be underestimated.

I'll post my first attempt soon!

Chris

[kkara4 (Krishan)]

Awesome image Joe and many thanks for your imaging advice!

[OzEclipse (Joe Cali)]

Thanks for all the nice comments.

On the subject of temperature and keeping you and gear warm.
My water bottle was in my padded camera bag sitting on an insulting mat. I realized it would freeze and drank about half early on. Like Chris, the remainder froze solid over a 3 hr period.

I wore one of Geoff's Hepworth Freezer suits. Under that I wore a tee shirt, track pants and a thin polarfleece. I had a pair of Neos explorer overboots over my walking boots. puts about 30mm of insulation between your feet and the ice and a layer of insulation plus a layer of air all around your shoes. I felt hot up top and had to unzip the suit and pull it off my shoulders a few times when I started to sweat. My feet were always warm. However, during totality, like Chris, I had to remove gloves during those few minutes of totality and my fingers suffered mild frostbite despite the fact I was otherwise quite warm.

With the benefit of hindsight, I'd build an insulating jacket for the camera and pack it with a few heat packs. I'd make the jacket out of insulating foam mat with perspex windows at the displays and cutouts at the controls. Same advice applies for anyone contemplating doing aurora photography in far northern locations.

Joe