While not in the path of totality, we still got some cool effects from 2017’s solar eclipse with various forms of the pinhole camera.
Photographic Technology
First, the official, high-tech setup: two sheets of paper with a hole made by the end of a pen.
Note the red spot where the pen ink bled through during manufacturing of the pinhole. You can just make out a crescent on the “photographic plate” here held in my left hand. Here’s a better image:
Natural Photographic Technology
Of course, the leaves of the trees behave as pinhole cameras as well:
Natural Appropriation
Which led a coworker to capture the eclipse in the classic cup of coffee:
How do you hold a sunbeam in your hand?
Inadvertently, we also discovered the fist-hole camera shown below.
Note the crescent sun in the shadow of my slightly opened fist, proving you can view a solar eclipse without any special setup.
Solar Politics
On the other hand (haha), a different coworker remarked that it could look odd to passers-by, in this political climate, to see a group of people standing outside a building with their heads down and their fists raised in the air. Perhaps we were part of an Occupy Sidewalk or Dark Suns Matter demonstration. Of course, the moon is involved too.