I still get chills over these photos and I doubt that feeling will ever go away. To this day, I do not understand how I got so lucky. People prepare years ahead for a chance to get their career shots. Must be God's apology for me not getting H1B this year.
The Idea
The rumblings started in the fall of 2023. I came across a post on LinkedIn by NCAR, where a speaker was set to discuss the upcoming eclipses (the annular solar eclipse on October 14th, and the total solar eclipse on April 8th). It was a very informative talk, at the end of which I learned about the Citizen CATE program. I didn't end up joining the team, but it seeded my interest.
The Plan
At around the same time, I started revisiting the astrophotography work I did back in college. Now that I have my own SLR camera, I wanted to explore the concept of astrophotography on film. Lots of research led me to acquire a 500mm vintage Canon lens made specifically for the FD mount cameras. This was early March. T-1 month until the eclipse.
An eclipse trip to Maine was planned shortly after. Now preparations really started to take off. I started experimenting with different kinds of film, and practiced by aiming for the moon with decent results.
With careful consideration, I ended up with the following gear:
Canon F-1, my trusted camera;
Adjustable speed finder;
Canon FD 500mm lens;
Shutter release cable;
Kodak Ektachrome E100;
Front-mount solar filter designed for telescopes/super telephoto lenses;
A tripod from Amazon that I already owned before - it does the job well enough.
The Hiccup
I will briefly mention that a week before the eclipse, my camera got caught in the middle of a snowball fight, and ice slush landed in the shutter speed dial. This left me in constant state of worry for the next two weeks or so. This is an important detail.
The Day of the Eclipse
Horrible traffic all over New England. Thankfully we went through some dirt roads and ended up in the middle of nowhere, no service and no big crowds. I set up and so it begins. Aperture set at f/8. I shot one frame every 5 minutes at three shutter speeds: 1/250s, 1/500s, and 1/1000s by triple exposing. Manually re-focus every once in a while - focus can change when the lens is left out in the cold.
As we approached totality, problems started to arise:
It was starting to get colder and colder, and old school SLRs do not like the cold. The shutter could get stuck and not fire. And that's on top of the water damage my camera sustained just a week prior;
I knew I had to swap out film at some point because the shots will not all fit in one roll. However, the film counter is off because of all the triple exposures I took, so I had no idea how close I was to the end of the roll;
I was surrounded by trees, which meant at some point the sun might be obstructed by branches.
My solution:
I tried to keep the top of the camera warm to the best of my ability, and I took out the battery from the camera so that it now acts as a fully manual camera (a very useful feature unique to the F-1s);
I swapped the film towards the end of the partial eclipse regardless of how much film was left in the first roll. I simply could not risk totality, and I did this in a hurry;
I was then under intense time pressure. The moment I spotted the shifting branches, I stood up with my entire setup, including the tripod, and ran through knee deep snow for a clear spot.
The sky has fallen dark by now. I dismounted the solar filter, looked through the viewfinder directly at the sun. I saw the diamond ring. Click. Wind. Click. Wind. I saw prominence. Click. Wind. Bracket. I saw the solar corona. Click. Wind. Bracket. Oh no, the shutter stopped working. Press hard. Click. Wind. The sky was so dark you could see the stars and planets. The purple horizon. Diamond rings appeared on the other side. Click. Wind. The end.
I was frozen solid. My camera stopped working completely.
The Wait
I did not care if I wasted half of the roll of Ektachrome, the film had to be processed immediately. I mailed both rolls to the lab, and waited.
I may have cried a few times in between. Did I do everything right? Did the shots come out? Did the camera pull through?
The End
A happy ending indeed. I bursted out screaming in the middle of the work day.
Easily one of the most stressful weeks of my life. 10/10, I highly recommend.