Steve Ward

Nice detail , but the Moon set against a beautiful blue sky is one of life's little joys in my world ...

Managed to catch just seven frames through the clouds , and just this one frame showed any detail ... better luck next time eh ...

Astronomy kit is the one thing that I never buy online and have delivered . I always insist on picking kit up in person and checking the contents before departing for home. This way I get to let all the included clouds out of the boxes at the vendors location rather than my own ...

Rush job before the power goes off in five minutes ... decent seeing first thing ...

Conditions much the same as yesterday ... Hoping for a very early slot tomorrow so I can get done and dusted before a preplanned power cut ... 🤞

Photo .... ?

Bit wibbly-wobbly out there again today , found a few to play with though ... Still no SDO data available so you'll have to make do with my meagre efforts ... 🤣

I stand corrected , you learn somethng new every day ... 🙂

That's more like it , lovely steady disc in the brief blue patch first thing ....

The vitreous humour is the fluid that fills the eye , it cannot become detatched ...

Thank you Geoff ...

Garbage in , garbage out , one of those days ...

Dead link !

And don't forget that the mount has to withstand the tremendous forces exerted by the mindblowing "One revolution per day" that it's subjected to so don't skimp ... 🤣

Rough rendition from a very rapid capture through a misty , milky mess , hope to have another look later ...

Lovely seeing again early doors , soon went downhill but the first few sets provided plenty to stack ...

Lovely conditions first thing , shed loads of good frames collected ... The main region has grown tremendously overnight so I added today's offering to yesterday's GIF , and there's a new spot arrived too ...

Would that be Doug German .... http://astrophotographyonabudget.blogspot.com/ I mentioned his YT channel on Page 1 ...

Got that second look at 15:00 , conditions still rough but hey ... On a sad note , my trusty EOS 1000D that's done all my solar imaging for the last ten years finally threw in the towel half way through the session. She'd clocked up a pretty impressive 320,000 shutter operations so the old girl didn't owe me anything bless her ... ☹️ Replacements on their way as only one of my 'spares' can be tethered so hope the one worker lasts a week or so. And the GIF showing a decent amount of development since 06:45 this morning .

Another rough offering from the thinnest sliver of blue first thing , hoping for another bite later.

Taurus et al from 17,000BC ...

Slim pickings today ... don't venture too close ...

I'd make a full aperture filter with Baader film and some masks that you can add to reduce the aperture as and when. If you have exceptional seeing for the majority of the time the views full-bore will be magnificent , but I suspect you'll be quickly disappointed if your seeing is generally so-so. I try the Mak180Pro now and then when I think the seeing will allow it but invariably as soon as I get set up I realise that it's not worth the extra hassle , generally speaking 100mm aperture is about all the usual UK conditions allow.

Robert makes a good case for this nice little 60mm Mak ...

Had to be on it as soon as it cleared the trees with a grey blanket approaching apace. Remarkably good seeing , despite shooting through a thick haziness , which meant my exposure was at 1/100s instead of a usual 1/800s , but the seeing was good enough to let me get away with such long exposures. Stacked 90 from a rapidly grabbed 160. Was supposed to be at an outreach event this afternoon at Wicken Fen , held by Cambridge Astronomical Society , but I shan't be travelling to sit under overcast skies and the threat of thunderstorms ... ⛈️