Just got my B+W 110E ND3.0 filter yesterday.  Next weekend there is a total eclipse of the sun in Uganda so need the filter to be able to capture the event.

This morning I had a clear sun so decided to test out the filter. I put it on my Canon EF100 – 400mm L lense attached to my Canon 5D MK II. The settings ISO 100, F/32, 1/8000 and zoomed in by hand and took the picture. I then took it in to Lightroom and adjusted a bit mainly with the yesteryear preset and some sharpening and this is how it turned out.

Maybe not perfect but I am pleased with the result as I can even see some sunspots on the sun surface. I took another picture at a different zoomlevel so I can confirm that it was not just some dust particles I had captured 🙂

The picture was taken at 7:40 local time and i confirmed with a sun position calculator that the sun was about 16 degrees in elevation at the time which is similar to what it will be during the Total Solar Eclipse on the 3rd November 2013. This confirms that I should be able to also take a series of pictures during the spectacle. The sun get more intense the higher it is in the sky so it might have been that I would not be able to take the pictures if the sun was much higher. The even in Uganda will start with the sun about 30 Degrees above horizon and end when it is on the horizon.

So now its time to play around with the settings and maybe get 3 presets done for various levels of the eclipse to try make the most of the short event. the completely unknown factor will be how the total eclipse will look like and what settings will work as … there is no way to test that in advance.