Total Solar Eclipse 2017

The great American eclipse on August 21, 2017 featured a path of totality that stretched across the continental U.S. We were hoping for clear skies in eastern Nebraska near Beaver Crossing where we rented a charming farm house. But the morning of the eclipse saw solid clouds over most of the state. We set out for the northwest panhandle of Nebraska and drove six hours to get out from under the clouds. When we saw a break in the clouds we pulled off on a small road that went near a lake. The road was lined with other eclipse chasers. By the time the camera was set up on the tripod the partial eclipse phase was already in process. The exposures shown here were taken every 3 minutes. A few times a passing cloud blocked the sun. At totality, we took many exposures of different lengths to capture the large dynamic range. The main image here was a 3 second exposure. The exposures were controlled by a program on a laptop so we could just enjoy the wonder of the event.