1st August 08 solar eclipse shoot

Just another thought. Probably to use 70-200mm f4 for "close up" shoot with x-film blocked. What kind of damage it can be to the cmos sensor? I think maybe I can treat it as normal landscape shoot with the 24mm without any risk to the sensor, but Im not sure about the "close up" with long zoom.

Many thanks.

WL

Well, the sensor is only exposed for a fraction of a second (maybe 1/8000s) so as long as it looks OK you won't damage your sensor.

Some types of exposed film may let IR pass, but the sensor has an IR block over it anyway. The best film to use would be conventional silver halide B&W film (NOT color film or chromogenic B&W), which should block UV, IR and visible light.

A solar filter would be better of course, but it may be a bit late to get one now!

That is not safe. Don't forget, modern SLR's keep their apertures wide open until the actual exposure.

I'd be worried about frying the shutter and/or the AF sensors. The best bet is, of course, one of those metal film things that goes over the end of the lens. Failing that, get a spare lens cap, and drill a 2mm hole in it. Tape your dark film over the hole. If that makes the sun too dark, enlarge the hole 1mm at a time. You will have to prefocus manually. Don't look through this rig without ensuring the cap or film can't be knocked off. Astronomers typically tape their filters in place.

The surface of the sun is about 10,000 times as bright as the surface of the earth!

Get a solar filter. I've shot the sun at f/11 1/4000 s and it's still blown out bigtime, see below:

http://www.mreclipse.com/Totality/TotalityCh11.html#CFilter

Not too sure about the actual surface of the sun, but the sun's disk viewed from earth and filtered through the atmosphere is about 100,000 times brighter than a sunlit scene (not 10,000) - about 17 stops. On no account peer at the sun through your viewfinder without a proper solar filter on the front of your lens. Remember that any area of the sun not hidden behind the moon will basically be this bright, so even at the maximum eclipse you can do serious harm to your eyesight.

I would say that 2 days before the eclipse is probably not the best time to be asking this question. Thousand Oaks Optics produces a full line of threaded solar filters and they are very reasonable, ranging in price from $49-$59 for 37mm-82mm. Pretty cheap insurance against damaged equipment or worse, damaged eyes.

www.thousandoaksoptical.com/www/Products/camerafilters.html

Good luck with whatever method you end up using, I hope that it works for you but for future eclipses, I suggest you invest in a true solar filter, it will give you a lot more piece of mind and certainly be safer.

The most recommended way, this close to the event, is to prefocus a telescope or lens, so that the sun/eclipse is focussed onto a white card. That way reflected light will no way damge your sight or camera. Then photograph the card. I have taken a lot of pictures this way and no ill effects. HTH Ellis

It looks as though clouds are going to provide filtration...

Thanks for all the valuable suggestions and info. Im not even an amateur astronomy photographer, so a solar filter never in my buy list, just yesterday came across the news and thought would be nice trying a few photos. Anyway just read the weather forecast, Oxfordshire will be partly cloudy or even scattered showers tomorrow morning, what a shame... :(

Will try to get a proper solar filter for the next solar eclipse (will plan ahead next time), I suppose the solar filter is probably not expensive. Thanks again.

Regards, WL

After all, this morning turn out quite ok, managed to capture several photo, although not as what I planned. This morning was quite windy and cloudy, and was my first solar eclipse shot.

These are some of it. All cropped from original size, from 20D with EF 70-200 f/4. Location: Oxfordshire, probably only 12% blocked by moon (according to the news).