We didn’t get a total eclipse here in northern Colorado, but it came close—about 94% covered, according to one source. I wasn’t about to point my eyes or a camera at the sun to get pictures, though.
I was thinking about doing what I’ve done before: set up a pair of binoculars, and use a mirror behind one eyepiece to project an image of the sun onto a screen or a light-coloured wall. With 7×50 binoculars you can get a projected image three feet across pretty easily. It works for looking at sunspots, too. The hardest part is getting the binoculars pointing at the sun safely (that is, without looking through the things—I don’t need to tell anyone how stupid that would be) and keeping them pointing at the sun as it moves.
But I didn’t take the time for that. Instead, I just got some pictures of the crescent shapes on the ground under the trees, which are still pretty cool.
Pete Ford 