Filaments and Filaproms 15th February

These shots taken with the skywatcher ED80 and double stacked quark show just how dramatic fialments, filaproms and prominences can be when the image is inverted; gives a real sense of relief.  As the sun heads towards solar minimum active regions will become less common and these small filaments are likely to be one of the few features that can be seen on our star.  Fortunately this technique maximises their visual impact!

AR12497 Surging! 15th February

It was getting later in the afternoon, and the haze thicker and the sun ever closer to the horizon, but, as usual I couldn't resist cranking up the aperture with the 100mm Tal and the double stacked Quark,  I ended capturing this image of a small surge coming from this departing active region.  Taken with the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera.

Ha Full Disk 15th February

All the action seems to be centred in the northern solar hemisphere at the moment as this shot with the triple stack at 40mm and 700mm fl shows.  There's still a bit of work to do on the tmax tuners on this scope to tighten things up, but it shows initial promise as a workable unit.  The effect of uneven illumination is much more noticeable when imaging than when using it visually, and as a result this will make a great piece of equipment for outreach.

CaK Full Disk 14th February

Seems like it's been a while since I got some images in CaK light.  I think the truth is the clear skies have been so few and far between that when it was good I was playing around with the triple stack in Ha wavelengths.  Anyway, nice to see the sun down in the blue end of the spectrum again!  Taken with the 40mm scope at 700mm focal length with the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera and the home brew CaK filter.

Ha Triple Stacked Full Disk 14th February

Took pretty much all day for the clouds to budge on Valentines day, but by late afternoon it was clear enough to grab some frames.  There was still a lot of high cirrus hindering transparency but this was better than no view at all.  Taken with the 40mm triple stacked Ha scope at 700mm focal length with the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera.

M1.8 Solar Flare - 13th February

The first day of a week off work today, and was hoping for some solar.  The weather forecast said cloud but el-sol came out in the afternoon.  Imagine my surprise after I had set up and took the first look through the eyepiece to see a bright M1.8 solar flare in AR12497.  The clouds held off just long enough for me to capture this image of the event.  Taken with the triple stacked 40mm Coronado scope at 700mm focal length with the PGR Blackfly GigE IMX249 camera.  Hoping this will be the start of a great weeks solar observing!

*Edit* - really pleased!  This photo went front page on the NASA Spaceweather website on Valentines day, check it out!  http://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=14&month=02&year=2016

Ha Full Disk 7th February

Conditions were far from great this Sunday morning, with bands of showers in an unstable air stream ahead of Storm Imogen meaning I didn't have long to get an image in.  I think the focus was a little soft when I took this shot taken with the triple stacked 40mm scope at 700mm focal length with PGR Blackfly IMX249 GigE camera.  

The sun was having a bit of a crackle on a few of the active regions. Curiously it almost looks to me like the band of plage that marks the solar jet streams crosses from one hemisphere to another. The jet stream is more active in the southern hemisphere on the west of disk, but on the eastern quadrant the jet stream looks more active in the north. Just to the west of mid disk there is a bright patch of place on the solar equator that when you look at the filaments and other features would apparently look like the jet stream switches hemisphere here. An illusion or a real feature? who knows...