Solar Eclipse Was Sun-sational!

It was truly an event that lived up to all the hype! Especially in Orangeburg where the weather was ideal for the long-anticipated solar eclipse.

The photo to the right I consider the day's "money" shot because it shows the moment everyone patiently waited to see: totality!

This was the two plus minutes when the moon was completely between the sun and Earth.

This photo I took just moments after totality.  The moon and sun are separating, going in opposite directions.

I captured a bit of the "diamond" that many photographers sought.  That's the sun's bright light looking like the diamond on the ring.

One of my students, Thomas Blake, shot this short video that captured the excitement and anticipation of the crowd at Dawson Stadium as everyone awaited the eclipse.

South Carolina State's expansive football stadium was an excellent venue to stretch out and pick a spot from which to view the pre-eclipse and main events.

SC State's Marching 101 Band was in good form entertaining the crowd.

The school's Champagne Dancers moved to the groove laid down by the band.

The cheerleaders were in the mix too!

There were different science exhibits and demonstrations too.  These University of Alabama students launched, from mid-field, a balloon that would take photos and video of the eclipse from 100,000 feet in the air.

Professor Justin Smith and I viewed the activities and eclipse from seating by one of the end zones.

People of all ages and from SC State, Orangeburg and beyond came to the stadium.

These guys told me they drove 13 hours from New York to see the eclipse. They went first to Charleston, but then came west to Orangeburg after hearing Charleston may have heavy cloud cover- which it did.

Columbia, to the west, would be have cloud issues too.

Orangeburg would have some cloud coverage in the time before the partial eclipse began at 1:14, but it would clear out, giving us all an excellent view of this rare celestial event at "totality" which began at 2:43 and would last just more than two minutes, until the partial eclipse ended at 4:07.

Hats off to South Carolina State University for putting on a wonderful day of events, entertainment and education.  And to Mother Nature for nearly perfect eclipse day weather!

My efforts to photograph the partial eclipse were not very successful. To protect my iPhone, I taped an eclipse glasses filter over the lens- this in order to protect the camera from the sun's intense rays.

This was about as good a shoot of the partial eclipse I was able to get using this technique.

But the full eclipse "totality" shots I was achieved with my Canon DSLR camera made up for that.

I am using my favorite totality shot as the background image on my work computer. This will be a regular reminder The Great Solar Eclipse of August 2017!