90% of the US lives within an 8hr drive of totality, so traffic will be horrible
Oh, come on. Less than 5% of America actually cares enough about astronomical events to drive 30 minutes to see something. Much less book a hotel stay.
August 21st is a Monday afternoon, so how many employed Americans are going to ask for the day off, to drive 8 hours, with a 200mm telephoto lens or telescope?
If totality is the size of several counties, and lasts even ten minutes, how many people will be on the road within an hour of the event? Lunchtime (or even all day long) traffic is probably nothing even terrible in 40 out of 50 states. In totality states, traffic won't even compare to a sporting event.
The Willamette valley South of Portland is expecting over 1 million people. The hospital in Lincoln City (where it starts) had been stockpiling and planning for 3 years now. A friend in the event planning business said all portable toilets in the state have been rented, and they are bringing them in from out of state, at 6 times the normal rate. This is going to be a huge event, and gridlock on the freeway that Monday.
Hotels across Oregon are already booked solid. Court Priday, manager of the Inn at Cross Keys Station in Madras, said rooms have been gone for a long, long time. "We've been getting phone calls like crazy," he said. "We've been sold out for about three years."
You are correct, sir. And thinking about OP's statement a little more, maybe staying off the road is a good idea in the sense that a two minute eclipse can distract drivers on the road.
But in general, unless you happen to glance at the sun in your field of view during the eclipse, it's all the darkness of passing clouds for most of the country.
Are traffic accidents statistically affected by proximity to a total eclipse of the sun?
I watched a total eclipse in England in 1999 parked up on the side of the road with other cars doing likewise as far as the eye could see in both directions. Traffic was at a standstill all morning.
Get to where you want to be the day before, and stay there.
My coolest memory of a total eclipse was standing high on a cliff edge over looking the sea. As the sun went totally dark I the moon's shadow move quickly along the beach covering everything in darkness.
Really good points that you made, but I personally think it's good to find a high location with a view so you can take in more than just the sun/moon.
Interesting. The internet says the shadow of the moon during an eclipse has a speed between 500m - 1500m per second. So from a high point you really can see the shadow racing across earth.
I'll strongly second point 5. I saw the 2002 Eclipse from central Australia and it was kinda primal, I regret the time I spent getting a few crappy photos and wish I'd just soaked in the experience without doing that. Other people took and shared _way_ better photos than mine. I won't make that error again. (I don't think I'll make it to the US for this one, but if I do I wont waste time with a camera...)
> Other people took and shared _way_ better photos than mine.
Since the dawn of photo sites on the web, I've completely stopped taking photos of anything except family and friends. What's the point when a thousand photos exist of everything, from every conceivable angle, within 5 seconds of googling.
Even if you manage to get an incredibly cool picture, then what? Nobody pays for photos anymore. Your closest friends will give you a "like" and move on to a million other cool photos. Chances are that even you will never look at your photos again having amassed tens of thousands of them.
It's going to get much worse within a few years. With continuous surveillance cameras everywhere and "life recorders" capturing in high resolution and 360 degrees there won't be an event witnessed by human eyes that hasn't already been photographed or videoed.
Photography as a creative endeavor is dead but people don't know it yet.
> Don't plan to drive anywhere on eclipse day (90% of the US lives within an 8hr drive of totality, so traffic will be horrible).
Speaking of driving, anyone from the Seattle area have any thoughts on the best approach?
The first one that comes to mind is to take 5 down to the path of totality.
The second thing that comes to mind is heading east toward Spokane, and turn south at Yakima and head on down 84 to somewhere in totality.
I've driven the 5 route a few times going between Seattle and California, so I know the roads are reasonable. The big unknown will be traffic. It will have a lot of people from Washington heading down plus the Portland crowd.
I've never headed east from Seattle past, I think, North Bend, so nearly everything on the second route is completely unknown to me.
My bet is that you'll get as far as Portland and then be stuck. I-5 through PDX can be a mess on a regular Monday. Get south of Portland on Sunday and you might be ok.
The Spokane option might work but the unknown there is that most of the roads in Oregon will be one lane each direction with hundreds of thousands of visitors expected in that area.
I reserved a campsite at a garden outside of Salem with a friend for Fri-Mon. The Oregon State Parks links to a page with a list of events and venues that are taking reservations.
Frankly, I find most of the comment by gmiller123456 ridiculous.
There's more to eclipse than looking at the sun. Horizon is also very important, especially the unobtrusive western horizon, where the shadow is coming from, and where you can see dancing light rays from beyond the shadow.
Photography is really not recommended, unless for science, since you have really two minutes of the greatest spectacle of nature, and photography doesn't really do justice to its grandeur.
If you're going to photograph an eclipse, do so with extreme care in your choice of methods and equipment. Don't just aim a camera at the sun and hope for the best! Focusing solar radiation onto a light sensor, be it the one at the back of your camera or the one at the back of your eyeball, is a good way to destroy it.
> 2. A 600-800mm lens is optimal for photography. Anything short of 200mm is useless.
Only if your goal is a closeup shot. I'd be much more interested in a shot with significant context. How easy that is to pull off I don't know, but I'd love to a nature landscape shot @28-35mm (FF) with the eclipse in the sky instead of the sun or moon.
The sun is like 1000x brighter than any object you'd be able to get in the foreground. If you just want a shot during the totality with the corona, it would be possible to get it and expose some other things a little bit (though you will probably need to increase exposure quite a bit...).
But if you want any of the partial phases, you need a solar filter (not just ND filters), and that thing basically blacks out anything that's not the sun.
You could do something with multiple exposures and a filter swap, but you'd need to use care in making the exposure without the solar filter - maybe a handheld card to keep the sun out of the lens. If you've got a drop-in filter holder that can take a solar filter, it'd be a lot easier than using thread-mounted ones.
These are really great tips. I was thinking about driving into the path of totality on the day. After thinking about it more and the hype that is surrounding this thing I am probably not going to. The highways are going to be jam packed (I-95). Reserving a place to stay or something similar in an area is also probably out of the question.
The annular eclipse in California in 2012 really didn't draw much in the way of crowds. Some friends and I drove up to near Mt Lassen and found a field with no real traffic or crowds to contend with. There were others in the field we ended up in, but it was really pretty straightforward.
It seems like there's a lot more hype around this one; I'm not sure why. Maybe 'total' vs 'annular'? Personally, I think they're both pretty spectacular, and annular eclipses have the added benefit of having the awesome ring-of-fire effect.
#3 is very hard if you are living more than 8 hrs drive from the totality zone. Population-wise way more than 10% of the US lives more than 8 hrs from the totality zone.
If you can get east of the Cascades from Portland, that would be your surest bet. Even if the weather is expected to be clear in the Willamette Valley on the 21st, there is a risk that the marine layer could settle in and not clear by the time of the eclipse. The risk is less in August than now, in June, but it could happen.
1. Don't plan to drive anywhere on eclipse day (90% of the US lives within an 8hr drive of totality, so traffic will be horrible)
2. A 600-800mm lens is optimal for photography. Anything short of 200mm is useless.
3. Don't make any solid plans until 3-4 days before. Most places only have about 40% chance of it being clear.
4. If you're photographing the partial phases. Stop and check everything (batteries, memory card, focus, etc) about 5 min before totality.
5. If you have any technological issues during totality, just sit back and enjoy watching it.
6. On eclipse day, if you're in a place that has 2 min or more of totality, just stay there. There's not a lot to be gained by risking moving.
7. All across the US, the sun will be high in the sky, good horizons aren't necessary.