So the big anticipated moment arrived and you knew days in advance that it is going to be great. You also knew very well that to represent the essence of the eclipse, you really need equipment more specialized than what most of us own, especially if the application of for rare events that only repeat themselves maybe every 50 years, give or take.
What other choices do you have other than setting up with your best gear available, fine tune the settings to the best of your ability and then stand back and allow the scene to gracefully take its path while you also take a moment and step away from your duty and just absorb and admire the phenomena.
Got these images with a 18-200mm lens each taken on 3.0 sec at f11 at full 200mm focal length, activated the Exposure Delay Mode on my D300 to minimize camera shake and dialed to Self-Timer at 2.0 sec countdown. I gave it my best shot, or 38 of them, and stitched together this animated GIF.
I enjoy the timeless "passing by" effect of the image it created. It made me realize, "I am just a spectator of a much greater reality" and I am content with that.