The eclipse is history. I had a long, hot, hot day out on a beautiful farm in Christian County, Western Kentucky. I was well prepared so it was all good. I met and spoke with interesting people. Made some new friends. Several with just their iPhones asked if I'd send them a few images. Absolutely. Happy to. In fact, that's already done.
The long wait was over. It started. Spectacular! Awesome! Breathtaking! Magnificent! Wondrous! A phenomenon-extravaganza like nothing else in nature! And then it was over.
Then began the arduous task of getting out into the incredible traffic, being patient, kind to other drivers. Several of us who kept creeping along together began conversations through our car windows. Thunderstorms brought that to an end. That's probably a good thing. Texting is probably only slightly more dangerous. After about four hours and only having gone about 20 miles, I began to wonder if it had been worth it. The traffic was epic! And by epic, I mean a seemingly endless, bumper-to-bumper mass of men and machines. I AM WELL AWARE THAT THERE WERE LADIES AND KIDS TOO SO DON'T GO ALL CRAZY ON ME! It was a common site to see a man and his sons facing away from the traffic taking care of necessary, normal functions. Other amazing men were seen shrouding their girlfriends, wives and daughters with blankets as they accomplished similar tasks. There weren't any options. It must be awful to be a lady in those situations.
When I finally got home a few hours ago and began going through my images it became obvious. Absolutely worth it! ABSOLUTELY! I'm working on more but these tell the story of the Great American Eclipse of 2017...the way I saw it. Actually the way my Fujifilm X-T2 saw it. "How do I love the, Fuji. Let me count the ways!"
I decided to use a more traditional astro-filter (orange) before totality and then switched to a less common, white-light filter after totality. You'll see the full sun (orange) before the big show started and end with the full sun (white) after it was all over. I've been doing photography many decades but never this. I knew getting partial eclipse images would not be a problem because I've been practicing shooting the sun for several weeks. What I was intent on trying to get (OK, I was stressed. I wasn't sweating because of the heat...OK, that too.) was Bailey's Beads (just before totality) the corona and sun-flares during totality and the Diamond Ring at the very end of totality. I don't generally pat myself on the back but I was way more successful than I had imagined. I am thrilled with the results. I freaking nailed it! Hope you enjoy.
