WC: Eclipseption - LotsaSmiles Photography

Before we get too departed from the excitement of the great American eclipse this year, I wanted to share a fun photo with you.

With cameras painfully ubiquitous, it is increasingly difficult to present any new ideas. But I love a good challenge, and I’m always trying to push myself. Sometimes, the unique concept comes from how the picture is taken. Other times, the creativity shines in the editing.

For the eclipse, I had several ideas for what I wanted to get. Unfortunately, it’s a rare event that only lasts two minutes, so I couldn’t shoot everything I wanted. I was focused more on simply capturing as much as I could, with the option to do different things with the images once secured (and I enjoyed various editing liberties with several similar shots).

I was pretty stoked when I got the pictures home; they were just as I’d hoped. And then the internet exploded with thousands of exactly the same image.

This was said to have been the most photographed eclipse ever, so it’s no surprise that they were mostly all the same. I did the HDR; I did the diamond ring. I have the corona and the prominences.

But so does everyone else.

I had thoughts of throwing together a composite, showing the various phases of the eclipse. While these are less commonly seen, they still aren’t anything all that unusual.

But as I was playing around with that, another idea came to mind. What if I stacked each phase into the negative space granted by totality, layering each into a concentric pattern?

The result looked almost comical to me. Aaron instantly loved it. I shared it with a few friends, and I even got the response, “it’s so awful I love it!” Now, the more I look at it, the more I kind of like it. It’s certainly different from most of the others I see out there.

So I thought I’d share it here. What do you think?

And if you’re curious how I made this composite, I’ll be featuring this in my next newsletter. Sign up here to see the behind-the-scenes!

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