Here's another 6 pane mosaic taken with my homemade CaK filter, 70mm frac @ f11 and DMk31 camera. I had a tweak with the alignment of the second interference filter in the setup and this seems to yield slightly more detail than previous images. I like being able to image the sun at these wavelengths with larger aperture than the CaK PST! :)
Images of the Sun, our local star, at a range of wavelengths with specialist solar telescopes. Imaging tutorials, solar bits and pieces for sale, talks and outreach with the Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Project CBSAP.
Thursday, 28 April 2011
Monday, 25 April 2011
CaK Full Disk 25th April
I've been away on holiday for a short break over the Easter weekend, however the day before leaving I finally successfully completed the prototype design for a CaK filter. This filter uses 2 sets of interference filters, both centred on 394nm, however these are set slightly offset to each other in a tilt tuned arrangement to tighten the bandpass still further. An energy rejection filter is also incorporated in the optical train, prior to the tilt tuned CaK filters which enables the filter to be used with either my 70mm or 127mm refractor. I haven't got many images so far from this setup, although first impressions are very favourable. Detail levels are high, and seem to have better resolution than commercially available Lunt CaK wedges? Maybe this is a result of a tighter bandpass? The Coronado CaK setups have a 2.2A pass, where as the Lunts have a 2.4A pass.
Transmission levels are very high, and while most definitely not suitable from a safety point of view for visual observation, exposure times are in the region of 1/2000th second at zero gain @ f11 with the DMK31. This has the potential to capitalise on the moments of good seeing, and also the possibility of exploring prominences at CaK wavelengths.
This is going to prove to be a very interesting filter!!!
Ha Full Disk 25th April
The weather has been behaving this month, and as such i've been lucky to be able to observe and image on a regular basis. Here's bank holiday mondays full disk taken with the DS40 and DMK31. This is a 'one shot'. Today had alot of interesting proms and filaments on display which were a visual treat in the eyepiece!
AR1195
Taken with my 127mm refractor at 1900mm fl, 706nm filter and DMK31 camera, the main active region on the sun today puts on a good show!
Monday, 18 April 2011
AR1191 AR1193 Hi-Res Mosaic
The best seeing conditions of the year so far allowed me this morning to do a high res mosaic of active regions 1191 & 1193. The shot was taken with my 127mm refractor, Lunt solar wedge, 706nm TiO filter and DMK31 camera. The mosaic was made using IMerge.
For best effect click on this link http://www.flickr.com/photos/56424473@N05/5631419994/sizes/o/in/photostream/ for the full size high res version of this image - MUCH better than the small preview on this blog!
Sunday, 17 April 2011
AR1191 & AR1193 @ 706nm
Solar activity is really hotting up now, with several large active regions on the disk. Here is a good example of this in the form of AR1191 and AR1193. This image was taken with the 127mm refractor at 1900mm focal length using the 706nm TiO filter and DMK31 camera. Unfortunately poor seeing on this day meant this was as 'close' as I could get to these spots before image resolution just fell away. Still, i'm pleased with the detail this image shows!
AR1190 @ 706nm
The 706nm TiO filter has been working overtime, with it's ability to produce top notch images in the worst of seeing conditions it promises to deliver the goods over and over again in this new solar maximum!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)