I made my initial post to the wrong topic. Hope this is the right one.
Norborne, population 708, is the self-proclaimed Soybean Capital of the World and holds a Soybean Festival every year during the weekend of the second Saturday in August. I chose this site to view the solar eclipse to avoid the crowds and traffic that was surely to descend on nearby Kansas City, St. Joseph and Lathrop. This city is 60 miles east of Kansas City.
This town was apparently on few people's radar, even though it is just a few hundred feet from 'ground zero,' because when I arrived at 4 am, I was the first one there. Within six hours around 9 cars were parked nearby. The sky was a solid cloud, and it rained off and on, with the occasional thunder and lightning. By noon with not even knowing the location of the sun due to the dreary skies, I had given up all hope of seeing the eclipse, and had mentally accepted that I would just video the darkening skies.
At just past noon, all the other cars had left, probably assuming that seeing that stellar event was a lost cause, and headed for other possible sites where there might be better weather. However, around 12:30, I noticed a break in the clouds to the south. It kept getting larger, and then around 12:50 pm, I could make out the sun's location. I took my first photo of the partial eclipse stage just after 1 pm as the last remnants of cloud cover around the sun disappeared. The skies around the sun became crystal clear at 1:05 pm, just 4 minutes before totality was to start.
I thanked the weather gods, and then stood in awe for about 20 seconds to view one of nature's grandest spectacles before I started taking photos. I had to compose myself, as my fingers were shaking a bit from all the excitement and anticipation that had built up awaiting this grand event.
I used a Canon 7D Mark II. The partial eclipse photos were done with the Canon 100-400 Mark II. I cut a circular piece of solar film from an 8 x 8 sheet and sandwiched it between two UV filters to make my own solar filter. At totality, I used a Sigma 150-600. All shots handheld. F9 used for all shots. Autofocusing used throughout. Bracketing sequence for all shots: -2, -1, 0, +1, +2.
For HQ photos and four short videos:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ersten/albums/72157685578090803