A Small Place in Celestron Eclipse Highlights Video

I received an email today that said "Congratulations! Your footage was chosen to be featured in our Eclipse video."

Awesome!

Well, sort of...

Yes, part of the time lapse video I shot while at Camp Drake in Marshall, MO, as a member of the Project Stratoclipse team is included. It's even the background for the main title of the film! But it's just the clouds that obscured our view of the eclipse racing overhead. Not the umbra racing over the clouds. Or the Sun's corona shining through the clouds.

Not complaining... how could I when I have my name in the credits?!? Seriously though, check out the Celestron video. Apart from my footage, there is a lot of other great scenes from the eclipse. I really like how they focused not just on views of the eclipse through telescopes and cameras but also on people and their reactions.

After all, it really was AWESOME!!!

Celestron Video Page

Mission Success!!!

Just a little over a month ago I trekked to Marshall, MO, to be a part of something HUGE!

Yeah, there was the total solar eclipse but I'm talking about PROJECT STRATOCLIPSE! Two guys from North Texas decided sending a weather balloon over 20 miles up into the atmosphere to take video during the eclipse would be a great adventure, a way to capture a rare astronomical event and use the results for science education.

They SUCCEEDED!

If you hadn't seen my previous posts on this, didn't follow along as we shared parts of the adventure live on YouTube and Facebook, didn't subscribe to the project YouTube channel, then CHECK OUT THIS VIDEO!!!

It's of the shadow of the Moon, the umbra, moving across the face of the Earth as the Moon eclipsed the Sun. Shot from near-space. Nothing above but the black of night and, far below, all those clouds that spoiled our view from the ground. Did I mention the umbra?!?

Beau Hartweg, Jake Vaught... thanks for allowing me to be a part of your adventure. Ron Drake, Leah Townsend and the rest of Jake's friends and family in Marshall, thanks for hosting us, for making us feel at home while there. I went expecting to make new friends but I had no idea how many! Timothy Kimsey and your friends at Outpost Worldwide including Michael Wunsch and Kelcie Matousek, it was great getting to know you and I'm looking forward to seeing the film-to-come.

Thanks to Dr. J, Rosalie and everyone at the Frontiers of Flight Museum for helping support Project Stratoclipse.

Partial Phase Eclipse with Sunspots

With the adrenaline rush of racing 11 miles south at the last minute with Beau Hartweg to see totality through relatively clear skies, after we returned to Camp Drake, base of operations for Project Stratoclipse, I almost didn't have the presence of mind to take advantage of the fact that the clouds had finally cleared and take any shots of the partial phase of the eclipse. I guess it felt like since I'd missed the first half and totality to clouds, shooting any close-up shots was anti-climatic.

And then I remembered the sunspots. The show was almost over by the time I was set up again but I did manage to get a few decent shots before the end. The first shot is from about 6 minutes before the end of the eclipse and the second one is from less than a minute before the end (4th contact or C4). Note that in the second one there is another group of sunspots visible that were covered by the moon in the first one.

Pretty cool! Can't wait for 2024!

For anyone interested, these were shot with a Nikon D7000 and a Nikon 80-400mm lens on a (roughly) polar-aligned equatorial mount. The shots were taken through a home-made Baader film solar filter.

About 6 minutes before end of eclipse (C4), one sunspot group. 

Less than a minute left before C4, second set of sunspots now visible.