David Smith

Wasn't bad in Ca-K either

Seems there was quite a bit of activity that day.

Spent many years studying spots via solar projection before full aperture filters became a thing / affordable.

Having used an 1100D to image the Sun, focusing is very tricky. The most reliable method I found was to connect the DSLR to my laptop so I could focus using the live image on the laptop screen. If there was a decent sized spot / group (spots that are visible at the moment are relatively tiny compared to the size of the disk as John mentioned above) then I was able to use live view on the LCD. John mentions an ND filter as the image you posted is possibly a bit over-exposed, so get the exposure right down, my raw files looked very, very dark straight off-camera. You don't mention exposure time but it was rare for me to use anything slower than 1/2000 second with my 120mm frac.

They look a little out of focus. What camera did you use?

Great start with the new kit Steve.

Nicely done. Good prom capture

Nicely done 👏

The Sun made a brief appearance today but the seeing was horrible, so don't look too close! Managed just a couple of images before clouds came back and forced an early conclusion to the session.

White light full disk with the Bresser

White light close up with the Skywatcher

And AR12806 in H Alpha using the Skywatcher / Quark combo

I did shoot some Ca-K but the results were not pretty Maybe next time

Good result. Seeing was horrible here today, looks like it was better down your way.

Great result. All cloud here yesterday.

Great shot John

Nicely done. Back at work today so no imaging for me.

Great shots, love the Ca-K disk.

Nicely done Dave, takes a couple of sessions to get back on track after the winter break.

First session of the year as the Sun is out of reach from early November to end of January. Add in a busy work schedule, DIY projects and other interests and all of a sudden its March! First session after Winter is always a bit of an adventure, mount has been sat unused for 3 months+ and I've apparently forgotten everything I ever knew about solar imaging (didn't amount to a lot to start with). The mount needed a good clean up and the declination axis attending to as it was very stiff and had developed a heap of backlash. Still managed to cobble together a few images below, far from my finest works but a good start.

Feels good to be solar imaging again

Ca-K full disk mosaic shot in 6 panes and stitched in Autostitch. I'll go back to partial inverted disks with proms when I get my head around how I used to do it For now I've done a separate prom shot.

White light image of the out-going AR12804, same scope but using the Lacerta wedge, Solar Continuum and UV/IR cut filters and ES 2x barlow.

Finally H alpha, same scope again with the combo Quark and ES 2x barlow. A little bit of newton rings showing on the screen whilst shooting so I used flats for the processing of both images.

Apologies, orientations are probably all over the place but the brain cells need a little shake-down time!

They look pretty good to me.

Nicely done. Do you have to mosaic the K line / ED80 shots to get a full disk with the 178?

Day off today and the skies cleared briefly this morning! Had a few things to try out with the Quark so grabbed the scope for a look see. Saw clouds inbound so grabbed the laptop to try and grab a quick Ca-K disk, just about managed to get 500 frames in before the clouds arrived. Seeing looked horrible through the Quark and it definitely isn't flattered by Ca-K! Despite Raben showing no activity I was quite pleased to see some activity with some active areas and some nice proms on show in the Quark.

Wow, the time lapse is awesome

Still a great shot.

More clear, sunny skies so had to take a look. Still quiet (oddly enough) but the faint prom on show in Ca-K yesterday has evolved quite nicely. Took the Evostar out to start with today and spent quite a bit of time visually scanning the white light disk. Picked up an ES 82 degree 4.7mm eyepiece this week, this gives me 212x in this scope and I did not expect it to work but actually in moments of good seeing it was brilliant!  Some lovely views of granulation and the odd pore too. For imaging though it had to be the Bresser as the breeze was too much for the Evostar.

Thanks all. If you look really close you can just make out that prom in the Ca-K disk at about the 11 o'clock position.

Very quiet sun at the moment but couldn't waste the sunny, if rather windy conditions. Limited to using the Bresser again today because of the wind gusts but then there's not much to see anyway

Despite the lack of activity those are still cracking images.

Typical, weekend arrives, sunshine forecast and nothing to see