use real butter

Butter headquarters is coming to you this morning from The Land of Enchantment – New Mexico! Jeremy has a meeting here and since we are fans of the multi-tasking, I suggested we stop in Albuquerque on the drive down, to… you know, SHOOT THE ANNULAR SOLAR ECLIPSE?!

Albuquerque was along that narrow swath to get a perfect ring when the moon passed between our sun and our beloved planet. Jeremy, native son of New Mexico, suggested getting a high vantage from someplace like Sandia Crest, 5000 feet above Albuquerque. Several hundreds (thousand or more?) had the same idea… The forest service had the tremendous task of managing parking and emergency services while throngs of excited people flocked to the long north-south ridge crest. My National Parks Annual Pass got us in the door (they turned cars away that didn’t have a recreation pass – those folks parked further down the road).

to my south: my setup and fellow eclipse watchers

to my north – more eclipse watchers

For those wanting to know, here is what I shot with: my main system was the Nikon D3X with the Nikkor 500mm f4 lens (lens courtesy of Pro Photo Rental, they are the best!) and a sheet of Baader Astrosolar safety film courtesy of Doug Duncan, the Director of the Fiske Planetarium at the University of Colorado, Boulder. My second system was the Nikon D700 and a Nikkor 24-70mm f2.8. My third system was the iphone.

the sun, high in the sky

It took 30 minutes to scout out a proper location without obstructions and without getting in anyone’s way (remember, you want a clear path all the way to sunset). We finally settled among a group of the nicest people from New Mexico, Texas, and even two charming gentleman from as far away as the UK! There was a buzz of excitement in the air, even with over an hour to wait before anything actually happened. Jeremy and I had our handy solar eclipse glasses we purchased from our local hardware store (McGuckin – they’re awesome!). We purchased a dozen extras and proceeded to hand them out to anyone who needed a pair. [One New Mexico resident, Joseph Woods, was so appreciative he gave me his card and said I could select one of his artworks as a thank you – so sweet!] Before long, people were sharing food and filters and everyone was so damn nice! We should have eclipses more often.

the view over the rio grande rift valley

getting dimmer during the eclipse, but it was still incredibly bright out

Around 6:31pm (according to my camera time stamp), the moon began to take a small nibble out of the bottom right corner of the sun. We had about an hour to totality (when the moon is directly centered on the sun – in this case, the annular eclipse results in a ring). Mine was likely the most powerful magnification in my vicinity, and since eclipses are thankfully slow, I offered to let my neighbors look through the camera at the sun, sunspots, the shadow of the moon throughout the phases. SCIENCE!!! I photographed the disc of the sun with the big guns, but Jeremy reminded me of other fun things like eclipse shadows and pinhole projections.

pinhole projection on the only paper i had

cool eclipse shadows from the leaves projected on a rock (photo by jeremy)

the sun at totality – it’s still super bright

pinhole projection at totality

**Jump for more butter**

People often ask how I shoot things like lightning, meteor showers, the moon. To be honest, it took a lot of attempts and screw ups and reading for me to manage any level of competency and I’m *still* screwing up and I’m *still* learning. But after the recent supermoon event, I thought it might be helpful to document a little of my process. The moon, unlike lightning, is something you can plan for well in advance (thank you, SCIENCE!). And unlike meteor showers, you can know exactly where it is going to be. It’s also pretty big, which makes locating it less of a mystery.

ye olde supermoon rising

When I first took interest in photographing the moon, I would see it outside, grab my camera and take some photos. I usually got bupkis, or something close to it. My moon was a teeny white dot on a sea of black night sky, usually void of any details. The nice thing about the moon is that it makes a regular appearance in the sky and the great advantage of digital is that I could burn tons of crappy images and learn from my countless mistakes relatively quickly.

here is the setup i used on the supermoon

Right now, I’m gunning for a big moon, because I have never nailed that to my satisfaction. I don’t do enough serious telephoto photography to justify dropping $8,000+ on a single lens and I don’t know that I ever will. However, I do have the option to rent these very expensive, very wonderful, very powerful telephoto lenses from my friends at Pro Photo Rental in Boulder (they ship US and Canada). You can, of course, do remarkable work with landscape captures of the moon. My mentor and friend, Michael Frye, achieves this routinely (and beautifully). The lens I used was the AF-S NIKKOR 500mm f4G ED VR, slapped onto my Nikon D3X (full frame, 24.5 MP). I wanted as many pixels as I could get to resolve detail on the surface of the moon. As it was, capturing the supermoon with the 500mm on my D3X yielded a moon that was only 2.3% the area of the image. Small, huh? Crop city.

the lens weighs over 8 pounds

i always swap out the foot

It’s important to note that just because you get a hold of a lens, like let’s say, a 500mm lens for a day, don’t expect that you’re going to know how to use it the first time you try it out. There’s an adjustment going from your typical 50mm to a 500mm (or even to a 300mm). It’s a different beast altogether. Practice well before “go time”. Take a look at your images and figure out what you’re doing. Do your homework. How many people have purchased new gear right before going on a big trip? I’ve done that. Missing a great shot because you didn’t figure out the technical details when you should have is sad. Been there.

I currently use the Really Right Stuff (RRS) system of quick-release clamps, L-plates, and lens feet. So I invested in the RRS lens feet for the Nikkor 200mm-400mm telephoto zoom and the Nikkor 500mm pictured above for the couple times a year that I do use those lenses. This ensures that the lenses are mounted rock solid to my tripod and ballhead (Acratech) setup. Speaking of tripods…

gitzo gt3531 series 3 carbon 6x tripod

**Jump for more butter**

No, it’s not a rerun… it’s just my weekend.

sunrise on the way to the airport

Less than a week after I had returned from California, I was headed right back to the Golden State. It wasn’t a business trip, it was purely for fun and I had Jeremy as my traveling companion. The priorities were: wine country, San Francisco, great food, seeing good friends (we’d have to stay a year to see everyone!), some rest and relaxation for Jeremy, and something important I needed to do.

mexican taqueria in bezerkeley with my buddy figs (cindy)

caffeine and cupcakes in healdsburg

suuuuuuushi

cannelés at the healdsburg downtown bakery

Having visited both the Napa and Sonoma Valleys, I like the Sonoma side. It is less foofie and the landscape is less manicured, which I prefer. I also loathe the traffic in Napa Valley. This is definitely my favorite time to visit wine country, because the leaves are turning and the weather is cool enough for me to feel comfortable instead of overheated (and angry). My friends always get a chuckle when I say hot weather makes me cranky, but for anyone who loves cool weather – you totally know where I’m coming from. It was delightfully cool and sunny – perfect weather for wine tasting and raiding all of the bakeries we could find.

maples were turning red

i can’t resist the red leaves…

a red-tailed hawk at the farmer’s market (sonoma wildlife rescue center)

i try to stretch fall out as much as possible

fiery reds

and some plump grapes on the vines that had yet to be harvested

**Jump for more butter**