One thing I never do is prepare for anything =) I've only really done solar observing with my telescope once and although I've had a lot of time to prepare I didn't and had a bit of a rough start this morning capturing the annular eclipse. By the time the Sun cleared my neighbors garage, the Moon had already taken a chunk out of its top and the first few minutes of capture resulted in some over exposed images.

I forgot how to adjust SharpCap to handle the Sun's brightness. Eventually, I realized I had set the gain too high, which prevented me from seeing any details on the Sun. Once I fixed that by lowering the gain to zero and adjusting the exposure to about 6 frames per second, and bringing down the red and blue levels to half, everything worked smoothly, and I managed to capture most of the eclipse in several 3-minute video clips.

I stayed indoors for the majority of the observation, controlling my telescope remotely from the dining room and occasionally stepping outside with eclipse glasses to experience it outside and visually.

There is a great feeling I get after a satisfying observation session almost like after a good workout or a long run. I wonder if other observers get this feeling?

Since I am in Southern California, we were only treated to 75% of coverage but it was still a nice site to behold.



One of the most valuable tools I've bought for my hobby is the TeleVue Sol-Search Solar Finder. Many folks on social media and in online discussions struggle to locate the Sun through their telescopes, but I found it incredibly easy to find and center the Sun within seconds using this compact and budget-friendly finder. I highly suggest giving this little gadget a try.

I was also curious to see if I could take some natural pinhole photos of the eclipse using tree leaves in my backyard, and I managed to do it successfully.

Next up is the Partial Lunar Eclipse happening during the full moon on the 28th, that I hope to capture if the clouds permit.