Eclipse over the Golden Gate Bridge

    Although San Francisco was just below the path of the eclipse to see a proper ring of fire, it has been quite amazing to see the tiny crescent of the sun right above the South tower of the GGB. Great day over the Bay!

    Composite of 34 exposures spaced by 5 minutes.
    The track of the sun was followed shooting at about 50mm using a DIY ND5 solar filter made out of Baader film.

    Please, see on black!

    Comments and faves

    1. ★

      shhflights, Leighton Wallis, RuloCIMA, Krissy_77, and 128 other people added this photo to their favorites.

    2. MasterTaker (12 months ago | reply)

      Awesome work and composition you created here!

    3. Pelo78 (12 months ago | reply)

      Thanks!
      Here in the Bay Area we have been extremely lucky to get fog only late in the evening...
      I was almost to go somewhere in the inland to try the shot (Mt. Diablo)
      Glad I didn't!

    4. erikacm6y (12 months ago | reply)

      That's AMAZING!!!
      I Think I saw you with a really cool equipment, close to Fort Mason?
      Great job!

    5. technofi2008 (12 months ago | reply)

      This is so awesome !

    6. Sararuna (12 months ago | reply)

      this is fantastic, subtle and serene.

    7. Sweendo (12 months ago | reply)

      What a neat photo!!!

    8. Grant Kaye (12 months ago | reply)

      Excellent work!

    9. NapsWithCats (12 months ago | reply)

      Well done!!!

    10. Holly Hickman SF (12 months ago | reply)

      I think this is my favorite one! Well done on so many levels :D

    11. ArneKaiser (12 months ago | reply)

      This is really good work! I am amazed at the wonderful result. Two thumbs up for this wonderful shot. Would you care to divulge some more of the technical side of this project?

    12. photographerpainterprintmaker (12 months ago | reply)

      Incredible! Saw this on Milky Way Scientist's Facebook feed. They linked back here and gave you credit. Credit well deserved! Awesome!

    13. Jamie Penn (12 months ago | reply)

      Cool shot Marco. Did you composite that in PS or was that something you were able to do in camera?

    14. Steven Weng (12 months ago | reply)

      Nice photo.

    15. tkidny (12 months ago | reply)

      JHC! Love it.

    16. chataut (12 months ago | reply)

      Love it!!!

    17. dradovanovic (12 months ago | reply)

      Amazing!

    18. Pelo78 (12 months ago | reply)

      Thanks to all for the comments and the fav!

      I input the exact location from where I was shooting on the map! (the end of the breakwater of the SF Marina)

      I stacked the images in post processing since my camera do not allow multiple exposures (As far as I know not many digital camera can do that) In theory this could be done directly in camera using film! no chances for error there though!

      The technicals: I kept the same camera settings for all the shots (1/1000, f/8, ISO100) the first 33 shots ere taken with the filter on, showing only the disc of the sun during the eclipse, the last one, taken when the sun was behind the clouds, with a ND 0.6 soft grad.
      Here (aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/AltAz.php) you could find the azimuth and altitude of the sun at the beginning and the end of the eclipse and use this info to pick the focal length needed to record the whole event (www.tawbaware.com/maxlyons/calc.htm). A bit of search on google map helped me to pick the best view on the bridge and path of the sun.

    19. Jamie Penn (12 months ago | reply)

      Thanks for the response Marco, very informative. You nailed it, great shot.

    20. Lyrinda (12 months ago | reply)

      Thanks, Marco, for a clear and complete description of how you created this stunning composite. You are a masterful photographer and astronomer. Well planned! We are the happier and better informed because of you. ;-)

    21. joan malé (12 months ago | reply)

      amazing. great job!

    22. Tim McManus (12 months ago | reply)

      Wow wow wow - what a great concept and result. I was just a couple hundred yards away from you - right in front of the yacht club building. This is the best shot I've seen of the event! Congratulations!

    23. helloratty (12 months ago | reply)

      OMFG. Really. Stunning.

    24. aguayo (12 months ago | reply)

      Well done!

    25. buckski (12 months ago | reply)

      nice. I rode my bike past you while you were taking these. best I've seen from this angle. WICKED

    26. Sherry Schmidt (12 months ago | reply)

      Thank you!

    27. melodeebeth (12 months ago | reply)

      Beautiful!

    28. CatDancing (12 months ago | reply)

      Wonderful composite! Nice job.

    29. mhlwfg (12 months ago | reply)

      Great composition! What puzzles me a little bit is the path of the sun, curved the "wrong" way. Ideally (i.e. no lens distortions, no atmospheric refraction) I would have expected a nearly straight path, slightly curved the other way around.

    30. Pelo78 (12 months ago | reply)

      I was a bit puzzled by this little mystery too...
      The curvature is emphasized by the change in shape of the sun but definitely it is there.

      I thought of 4 different explanations, one does not exclude the other:

      - During the eclipse at the maximum I unscrewed the filter to take a background shot that eventually wasn't included in the final composition. When I did it the tripod (which is not the sturdier you can find around....) moved a little bit... Assuming that this is the reason I should see a broken trajectory with a clear angle in the middle...

      - The lens I used shows some distortion which in this picture was particularly evident in the line of the water. I tried to compensate it in PP but maybe it's overdone or the geometry of the distortion I chose to compensate a straight line at the bottom of the frame resulted in a curved path of the sun...

      Or the curvature is real...

      Here are three examples of similar pictures I found on the web (the last two from the same eclipse but from different locations) where a similar curvature is noticeable....

      www.mreclipse.com/SEphoto/SEgallery2/image/TS E94-50mmSeqw...

      www.flickr.com/photos/ricoshanchez/7247066148 /

      www.flickr.com/photos/katiedarby/7252220922/i n/photostream/

      In the first picture the sun is significantly higher on the horizon and the curvature is extremely subtle, in the last ones, where the sun is lower the curvature appears to be stronger...

      The reasons might be:

      - The apparent curvature is caused by refraction from the atmosphere.

      An finally

      - The path of the sun in the sky is actually curved! I'm not an astronomer and maybe my reasoning is flawed but, if in the arctic summer the sun raises in the sky during the day and goes down without ever setting its trajectory in the sky must have two inflection points. We are somewhere between the equator and the north pole so maybe that's what I see in the pictures... (The sequence was shot starting from about 270Deg Azimuth and the sun on May 20 set at 297deg, pretty far north!)

      If there is someone out there with some experience in sun photography it would be fun to hear his/her thoughts!

    31. 97Starlight (12 months ago | reply)

      Wonderfully done!

    32. Wildabeast71 (12 months ago | reply)

      Very nice! Thanks for sharing.

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