The Milky Way reaches up into the sky over a nature preserve in southern Michigan. Originally a farm, the property in now a mixture of nature preserve, riding trails, and partially rented out as farm land. Whenever we are out and night we hear lots of wildlife. This night we were listening to frogs, and something loudly harvesting reeds directly in front of us. Coyotes are frequent visitors as well, and we often hear them while we are out there.

On the night of August 2, 2024, we were lucky enough to have aurora activity during a meteor shower. We took the opportunity to shoot star-trails as well. The result is this image, which has all three.

The lights from a massive aurora dance over the ruins of Fayette, Michigan. Fully half the sky was lit that night. The lights were strong enough that we saw color with the naked eye.

What better way to celebrate and remember the eclipse than with a collage of the phases of the eclipse? We took two phases, and the diamond ring portion of totality, and combined them into a single image.

This image looks particularly stunning printed on metal, with the brilliant aluminum shining throw to add extra pop to the glowing eclipse.

In 2024 good friends convinced us to travel to see the eclipse totality. This eclipse gifted us with several delights:

• Bailey’s Beads, where sunlight shines through the mountain valleys of the moon.

• Several brilliant red prominences, loops of plasma from the sun suspended in the corona.

• Lovely whispy corona, the thin outer atmosphere of the sun.

If you ever have the chance to experience totality in person, do it. The experience is magical, a reminder that the universe is bigger, and weirder, than we realize.