Well the weather for me of late (read this summer!) has been diabolical - the weathermans definition of fine sunny weather seems to be lots of clouds with the sun poking out now and then. This isn't much good for solar other than for a quick glimpse visually, and is certainly no good for imaging.
I was pleased to see this morning clearish skies, the milkiness had a tinge of blue to it, so I decided to go and get the solar kit setup. I was initially none too optimistic about what the results would be like, but as I processed the FITS files in Registax for wavelets I was pleasantly surprised at what was coming out.
There is a real show of active regions spanning the northern hemisphere on the Earthward side of the sun, with associated flaring and filaments to boot. The haze obscured the proms visually but they came out ok in the end on the image.
This was made using dark and 'pseudo flat' frames, and from my perspective the biggest impact these are having on my images apart from the removal of banding and dust motes, is how evenly illuminated the frame is. More subtly is the spicule ring around the solar perimeter is much more obvious. 40mm aperture isn't going to resolve individual spicules, however it is clearly visible whereas previouslly was not.
I'm officially now 'on holiday', so weather permitting should be able to get images up on here more often!
