Today there was a solar eclipse visible in most of North America. While Americans got to witness a total eclipse, up here in Canada we only got a partial one.
A lot of people have been preparing for the event with great anticipation while I had a rather causal attitude towards the whole eclipse watching thing.
Then I got the bright idea that perhaps I should try to take pictures of the solar eclipse, except I did not have any glasses appropriate for sun safety or to allow me to filter sunlight enough so that my camera will not saturate and I can actually take a picture of the Sun partially hidden behind the Moon.
So, I have decided to imitate what people used to do before cheap Chinese made protective glasses became widely available, and cover some piece of glass in soot.
Except I did not even have a piece of glass, so I have used an acrylic sheet, and covered it in soot by moving it around in the flame of a candle. Of course the acrylic got warped a bit — the glass must be covered in enough soot that one cannot see through it, otherwise it is pretty much useless for sun protection.
A piece of transparent acrylic sheet (plexiglass) covered in soot from a candle.
I used this as a makeshift safety glass for viewing / photographing the solar eclipse.
It did work, and the makeshift sun glass was suitable to glance at the solar eclipse and get a decent view (I did not dare to stare for any length of time) but photographing though it has turned out to be a challenge.
The camera kept focusing on the surface of the glass, I ended up setting it to manual and focus to infinity.
I could not adjust by sight, even looking at the direction of the sun just felt too bright. So it was a bit hit and miss, but I got some shots that are at least recognizable as the sun hiding behind the moon.
Well, that is what you can get with no preparation.