The subtle and ethereal beauty of the corona, the Sun's outer atmosphere, is seen in a High-Dynamic-Range composite image of the total solar eclipse on August 21, 2017 from Bandit Springs, Oregon in the United States. Processing here approximates the visual appearance of the corona during totality. Here the corona spans more than 5 solar radii and actually extends out of the field of view. The bright star Regulus (Alpha Leonis) is at bottom right, and magnitude 5.26 Nu Leonis is at left. Intricate detail in the corona is caused by the Sun's magnetic fields, which get twisted up and may contribute to the heating of the corona when they release a tremendous amount of stored magnetic energy. The corona is very thin, but has a temperature of more than a million degrees Kelvin and actually gets hotter farther away from the Sun. The solar corona can only be seen during a total eclipse of the Sun. The corona extends millions of miles into space and is made up of super-heated plasma at about 2 million degrees K.