Abstract
THERE have been in the past several proposals to take a cinema film of a total eclipse of the sun, jut the first real outcome of these proposals is the film now being shown at the Royal Albert Hall. The Dictufes illustrate the experiences and the work of the astronomers of the expedition, under Prof. W. W. Campbell, to Wallal, on the north-west coast of Australia, from the time they left Perth until after the eclipse. The journey to Broome was made on the S.S. Charon, and afterwards on the lugger owendoline, towed by a lighthouse tender, to Ninety Mile Beach. On account of the great rise and fall of the tides, the ship had to anchor five miles out, and the astronomers with all their baggage had to be landed in boats through the surf. The equipment was then transported on donkey waggons to the site selected for the camp, and in this work the aboriginal inhabitants of the country, both men and women, gave considerable assistance. The large amount of dust, which rose in clouds wherever there was any work being done, caused great inconvenience. Nevertheless a large camp was soon set up and the assembling of the instruments commenced. The process of erection of the tower telescope and of the equatorials and ccelostats, as well as the various rehearsals in changing plates and uncovering object-glasses, are well illustrated. The part of the film showing the solar corona is good, considering that it was taken with a cinema lens, but a better picture could easily be constructed from the negatives taken by the eclipse party.
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Cinema Film of the Total Eclipse of the Sun at Wallal, Australia, September 21, 1922. Nature 111, 687 (1923). https://doi.org/10.1038/111687b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/111687b0