One of the ways to get more detail and contrast when imaging the sun is to use a double stacked filter, Thows the region of plage on the limb. Coronado SM90, Daystar Quark and the PGR Grasshoppr 3.
Very little to see on the full disk in Ha this weekend, just a small region of quiet plage departing the limb. Not even any proms to speak of! Taken with the Coronado SM90 with the PGR Grasshopper 3 ICX814 camera.
The better seeing on sunday meant this CaK disk turned out the way I was hoping for! Be sure to double click the image, it's a big one! Taken with the skywatcher ED80 stopped down to 60mm, the PGR Grasshopper 3 ICX814 camera, and the homebrew CaK filter.
The seeing was having it's better moments on Sunday, so decided to get a closeup on the region of departing plage using the 100mm refractor at f20+, using the PGR Chameleon running in 12bit mode. Quite surprised at how clean the image came out. Taken with the homebrew CaK filter.
Another view of the snaking filament as it approaches the solar limb. Taken with the SM90 and a Daystar Quark for double stacking.
The main feature of interest today was a dark filament emanating from a region of plage from a relic active region. This has been quite dynamic over the past couple of days and just before imaging this a large section lifted off as the magnetic fields binding it snapped. The image was taken with the SM90 double stacked with a daystar Quark and used the PGR GH3 ICX814 camera.
The seeing was not great for the SM90 today - the spicule ring was just a featureless ring rather than the dancing forest of pampas grass it can be when conditions are good. Still, despite the sun being devoid of the usual prominences there was a nice filament and region of plage approaching the limb. Taken at 800mm focal length with the Grasshopper 3 ICX818 camera.
There was a patch of plage exiting the solar disk today from a relic active region from previous rotations. Seeing was not great but I imaged at 2.5 focal length at 80mm aperture using the PGR Grasshopper 3 ICX814 using 2x2 binning to get a better sampling rate. As with the full disk a smaller aperture would have likely yielded better results but on the whole i'm happy with this.
A far from ideal CaK full disk, but the first one i've been able to take in a while. The sun was heading into the trees (see the shadow bottom right) and the seeing was less than ideal for the 80mm aperture used, but it does show that the 1000mm focal length used fits easily on the chip of the PGR ICX814 sensor. Next time i'll try backing off the aperture to 60mm and see how I get on.
The sun may at times appear to be blank and featureless but there is often the subtle details, here is a old relic active region from a few rotations ago revealing itself as nothing more than turbulent plage. Taken with the SM90 and 2.5x barlow with the PGR Blackfly IMX249 camera.
Nothing to see here, move along... Saturdays disk is fairly typical of a solar minimum sun - the disk looks blank. There is a small region of very decayed plage from active regions several rotations ago but that it is it on the surface. The proms were the star of the show, and looked fantastic through the SM90 with an 18mm Coronado Cemax eyepiece. This image is a composite disk / proms shot with the PGR GH3 ICX814 camera. Poor seeing and haze were the order of the morning to give imaging that extra challenge, but it is nice to see the sun rising higher and higher in the sky with each passing week. Wonder how long these conditions will last until we see the signs of cycle 25 becoming more predominant and obvious in the solar northern hemisphere?
A new year and a new solar setup. As mentioned in previous posts I have a PGR Grasshopper 3 with a ICX814 chip that gives a 9.1Mp image which is great for full disks up to 1000mm focal length. I just bought a Coronado SM90ii, a rather nice scope that is fitted with a Feathertouch focuser.
With it's 800mm focal length the full disk fits comfortably on the ICX814 chip with room to spare, and with no newtons rings visible no tilt is needed either. Todays conditions were hazy at best and the sun is still skirting in the top of the trees, but with each passing week it gets higher and conditions get better. Looking forward to seeing what this scope is capable of this year!
