Reflected Sunshine at Sunrise 26th October

A beautiful start to the day, finally skies cleared just before dawn allowing me to image the morning conjunction of Venus, Jupiter and Mars in a triangle.  Difficult to see in this image scale is also Mercury, just above the gap in between the mountains.  Throw in Earth in the foreground and that's five planets in one shot, not bad going!  Just hoping the aurora put on a show tonight as the clear skies are forecast to stay.

Bubbling Clouds, Dancing Lights - Iceland Aurora October 2014

The clouds bubbled away as the aurora danced around in this 10 minute time lapse taken from Brekka in Hvalfjordur in Iceland.  Taken with the Canon350D, Sigma 10mm F4, ISO 800 and 30 seconds exposure.  

Brekka Aurora Animation - Iceland 2014

It's only taken me a year to get this animation together from last years images of aurora from Brekka in Hvalfjordur in Iceland.  About 50mins worth of timelapse here, taken with a Canon 350D, Sigma 10mm f4 lens at ISO800, 30 second exposures.  Hoping for something better in a weeks time! 

Icelandic Aurora Pt 2 - October 2014

I love the rays in this shot!  Hopefully weather permitting this year aurora will be more spectacular than those of last year with any coronal holes or active regions being closer to the equator and more geoeffective than previous years when activity was more poleward on the sun.

Icelandic Aurora - October 2014

One of my favourite shots of aurora taken in Iceland last October, really looking forward to going again in a couple of weeks, and hope the skies are clear and the aurora are string this time around!

AR12427 in CaK Light - 4th October

I ended up taking dozens of images in the poor seeing in the hope that one would come out, and this one did - the definition of lucky imaging.  The shot was taken with the 100mm Tal refractor at a shade over 3000mm focal length using the homebrew CaK filter and the PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.  This is not as sharp an image as I know I can get with this setup, but for a shot taken in early october with a low sun it works pretty well!

CaK Full Disk 4th October

A quiet sun, but there's always something to see in CaK wavelengths on the disk.  Taken with the 40mm scope at 650mm focal length with the homebrew CaK filter and the PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.

Ha Shots With the ED80 and Daystar Quark 4th October

Sunday offered clear skies, however despite the glorious blue the seeing conditions just weren't as good.  I tried the 100mm scope but seeing would not allow me to stack the images, so I dropped down to the 80mm scope.  The full disk just about managed the panes needed without too much variance between the panes.  It was nice to see a bit of activity!  Taken with the kywatcher ED80, Daystar Quark, Baader Solar Telecompressor and the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera.

CaK Selection from the 26th September

Using the Airy Labs solar scintillation monitor allows me to choose and process images from the times when the seeing is at it's best, and it works and is a recommended and nifty piece of kit for any solar imager.  Here is a selection of images from the 26th september using a range of scopes and focal lengths taken with the homebrew CaK filter and the PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.

AR12422 Animation with the 100mm Tal - 26th September

I took this animation over a period of about 8 minutes at 3 frames a minute, using the daystar quark, Tal100R refractor, baader solar telecompressor and PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera giving a focal length of just over 3 metres.  While there are some really sharp frames you can see the waves of poorer seeing in between.

AR12422 With the 5" Frac on the 26th September

A close up of this turbulent active region with the Meade AR5 refractor and Daystar Quark.  The scope isn't the best and is a bit soft, but i'm quite pleased with this slightly closer perspective of this interesting active region.

Shots From the 26th September with the Tal100R and Daystar Quark

I took the following set of shots with the Daystar Quark and the Tal100R refractor, using the Baader solar telecompressor and the PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.  Seeing varied at times but I think I got some half decent results considering.

Shots From The 26th September with the Skywatcher ED80 and Quark

The following images were all part of a set taken on the 26th september using the Skywatcher ED80 telescope, Daystar Quark, Baader solar telecompressor and the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera.  Seeing was variable throughout the day, but by shooting the subject a number of times, and by using lucky imaging it was possible to find some sharper images.  

Ha Full Disks 26th September

 Work has meant i've been slow in both processing these and also getting them up onto the website, however when taken the sun was nice and busy.  Seeing was awful and the first disk taken with the DS40 at 650mm focal length with the PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.  The second was taken with the Daystar Quark and the ED80, but this was falling foul of the poor seeing, and while it works at this image scale a close up view reveals the uneven seeing in the different panes that make up the mosaic.