Introduction
This was one of the most memorable experiences in my life, one in which I planned to see for about 8 years, since the last eclipse that crossed the US. My friend Mike and I planned the trip. About 6 months before the eclipse, I booked a hotel in Rochester, NY. This was in the path of totality and also gave me options to move either northeast or southwest if the weather in Rochester was going to be poor. About a week before the eclipse the weather was not looking so good. A few days before we made the audible to change plans. There was next to no chance that Rochester would be clear so we decided to go northeast, to Burlington, VT. The Rochester hotel was way too far to the west and everything anywhere near Burlington was sold out.
The Journey
So we settled for Albany, with a plan to leave very early in morning to continue on to Burlington.
We we woke up at 5:30 AM and were out the door by 6:00. We knew from past eclipses as well as the Phish retirement debacle from the past that it was likely that the traffic would be significant.
We picked Oakledge Park along Lake Champlain as our target location. It seemed like it had the most room of all of the viewing locations identified in Burlington. We arrived at about 9:20 AM and got one of the last parking spots in the lot.
We got our spot in the grass field and just had to wait.
The Totality
The partial eclipse started at 2:14. Within about 10 minutes the temperature began to drop a tiny bit, even though there was no visible change in the sunlight. When the sun was about half covered, it started to get a little darker. The crowd started to buzz. Even with only a tiny sliver of the sun showing, the sun was still too bright to look at directly, but at this point the dimming was noticeable. The temperature dropped significantly and I (and most people) put on their jackets. At 3:26, as soon as moon totally covered the sun, the light went out like a light switch. The moon was black and almost looked like it was a black hole. My brain just couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing and I had an intense feeling of Deja Vu like I had seen this before. Looking this up afterward, I found this reaction is common. You could stare directly at the sun with no issues whatsoever. It was extremely dark, so dark that I could not read the ISO dial on the camera, even 2 inches from my face. The stars came out. If you looked around, the sky looked like a sunset, with an orange glow about 270 degrees around the sky. A very young child near us began crying because they were so scared of what happened. The totality lasted over 3 minutes. When it ended, it was like a light switch was turned back on.
Photograph Process
All shot with a 300mm lens. Starting from left to center. For the phases I had a solar filter:
f/8 ISO 800 1/250
f/8 ISO 400 1/125
f/8 ISO 400 1/60
f/8 ISO 400 1/60
f/8 ISO 400 1/15
For totality, I removed the filter:
f/8 ISO 400 1/60
Did some light editing in Lightroom and then copied over to Photoshop as layers. In Photoshop, I rotated each of the partial phase photos so that the “cresents” were all lined up. Then I duplicated each layer and flipped them horizontally for the other side. Drew a line 45 degrees across the picture and aligned and rotated each phase. Adjusted the black level slightly to make sure the backgrounds all matched and then turned on guides to make sure they were equally spaced.
Video Footage
While the eclipse was occurring, I clamped my GoPro to my tripod so I could get some video to go along with the eclipse. I didn’t think it could amount to much, it was more just so I would have a live video of the moment.
I sat on the footage for a while, trying to figure out how to make it convey the eclipse. I knew I needed to do it right or else I just wasn’t going to share it. I was out running, listening to Eclipse by Pink Floyd and that was my “ah ha” moment. I had to do some editing to try to convey what we saw with our eyes. I think the lyrics overlaid with the time lapse of all families moving around and doing their thing really worked well together. It is about 1.5 minutes, turn up your sound and I hope you enjoy. Check out the wave of darkness coming from right to left.
I apologize in advance for the signature over image but this composition is unique and I’m a little worried about it being stolen.
Druding 
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