We never made it out to the area of totality since most of Texas was covered with clouds and rain was predicted, so we stayed at our son's house as it would have been a four-hour drive (one way) and with the weather, we felt it wasn't worth it. Now at our son's house, it would have still been 95.2% occluded. But all morning the sky was completely overcast. We couldn't see the Sun at all. And then at exactly 1:39, the moment of maximum occlusion, the clouds thinned for just a couple of minutes and I was able to get the first shot below. Then it clouded-up again but about 20 minutes later, the sky cleared-up completely and I was able use my good set-up, for that second shot.
Note that the first image below was shot hand-held since the clouds cleared-up so quickly that I didn't have time to set-up a tripod or even put on my filter. By the time that I took the second shot, I had time to set-up my tripod, switch to my long telephoto, install the ND 100000 filter and use bracketed shots.
April 2024 (Sony a6500, 18-135mm (X2))
April 2024 (Sony a6500, 400mm)
| 