Hughsie

As the day gets warmer the seeing is only going to worsen. I was up early doors and there was a large prom in the North West and a new active region AR 12844 in South East right near the edge of the limb. I first thought it was a dust mote until I got a closer view☺️

A selection of what the Sun had to offer on 15 July. Image 1 & 2 - An overview of the solar disc showing an active region, filaments and prominences. Presented in RGB and inverted. 25% of 1,000 frames stacked. Exposure time 2.4 ms, Gain =0. Images 3 & 4 - Active region AR12842 (Classification Hsx) presented in RGB and inverted. 25% of 1,000 frames stacked. Exposure time 14ms, Gain = 50. Images 5 & 6 - Anomalous prominence located on the South East limb and an estimation of its height. 100 out of 500 frames stacked. Exposure time 25 ms, Gain = 200. Images 7 & 8 - Selection of prominences on the North West limb. 25% out of 500 frames stacked. Exposure time 35 ms, Gain = 150. Finally, a short time-lapse for the prominences on the North West limb. 100 x 500 frame with 30 second gap inbetween. Equipment Lunt 60 mm TH⍺/B1200CPT scope. ZWO ASI174mm camera. SkyWatcher EQ6R-Pro mount. Altair Astro 3x Barlow used in images 3 through to 8. Captured using SharpCap Pro. Processed in ImPPG, PIPP, Affinity Photo and PixInsight. Thanks for dropping by. John

Wimbledon has been on the TV so naturally the clouds appear for nearly two weeks. I managed to capture the the full disc of the Sun this morning then I had to wait for breaks in the clouds to appear. Luckily the afternoon was more fruitful but still suffered from regular interruptions from the clouds. Fortunately I managed to capture some points of interest. Images 1 & 2 - Full disc in colour and inverted. Exposure time 2 ms, Gain = 0. 12% of the best 1,000 frames stacked in AutoStakkert 3 Images 3 & 4 - AR12842 (Classification Hsx) along with a nice filament and a small straight and curved pillar prom plus an anomalous prom. Exposure 10 ms, Gain = 80. 174 out of 1,000 frames stacked in Autostakert 3. Altair Astro 3x Barlow used. Images 5 & 6 - Straight Pillar Prominence on the South East limb of the disc. Note the same region of the disc in image 2 which was taken at 10 20 UT and highlights its evolution over the next 5 hours. Exposure 10.5 ms, Gain 80. 100 out of 1,000 frames stacked in AutoStakkert 3. Same 3x Barlow used. Equipment Lunt 60 mm TH⍺/B1200 CPT. ZWO ASI174mm with Altair Astro 3x Barlow where shown. SkyWatcher EQ6R-Pro. SharpCap Pro. Processed using PixInsight.

I always think that if you are going to do a job it is worth doing properly. Same with imaging. The simple fact is that if rubbish goes into the camera then guess what? Rubbish comes out. Being my own worst critic I thought I would not post these images but then I thought, why not, there is a lesson to be learned here. That lesson is this, if the seeing is joke, then do yourself a favour and go do something more constructive with your time. Wednesday was a classic example. Very high thin clouds, so much so that when I ramped up the gain to see the prominence on the North East limb I could actually see them. Some high thicker clouds even breezed through the images too. No flats taken. The dust speck on show to the top right of centre is not a sun spot and I didn’t use my tilt adjuster as I think in this case Newton’s Rings add character to these images 🤪 Btw the sun spot is AR12835 and with AR12836 lurking below it (not a speck of dust).

Saturday morning started off clear then as I completed setting up my gear the clouds started to drift in from the South. Again, another stop/start session which was a shame as there were some quite nice proms just asking to be captured as a time-lapse but it was never going to be. Image 1 - Full solar disc showing what is on offer. Nice plage area on the North East limb and to the South of this we have AR12835. Images 2 & 3 - AR12835 (classification HSX) captured with a 3x Barlow and then closer up with a Tele Vue 5x Powermate. Images 4 & 5 - The Plage area visible to the North East. Barlow/Powermate versions below. Images 6 - Prominence on the North West limb. Image 7 - Prominence on the North East limb. Image 8 - Prominence on South East limb. Thanks for dropping by. John

Saw the same this morning Rusted. Looks like it could be a nice AR, shame the clouds are heading my way again.

That is up close a personal. Lovely capture mate.

Wow, thank you.

I was dodging the clouds this morning and whilst the disc was not revealing much there were once again some really nice prominences on show. Image 1 - Full disc and overview on what is on offer. Two nice proms in the North East and North West limbs. AR12833 heading out of view and still with the large filament following. Maybe a filaprom in a few days? Image 2- A Ring of Fire revealing the prominences. Image 3 - Two proms on the North East limb. This was taken with a 3x Barlow.......... Image 4 - ......... and a close up of the larger prom taken with a 5x Powermate. I am really stretching the resolution of my gear at this magnification. Image 5 - Prominence on the North East Limb. Maybe a hedgerow prom?? Rain is forecast now for the next few days so hopefully you will have better luck where ever you may be. Good night. John

I always like to try different ways of imaging and processing and so this morning I was tinkering with the Binning on my ZWO ASI174mm, using 2x2 instead of 1x1 on the Barlow and Powermate shots. The pro’s were the frame rates using the x3 Barlow and x5 Powermate were much improved (in the low 100’s FPS) due to the lower exposure times as a result of the larger pixel size, but the images when processed were not great. Luckily the clear sky persisted into the evening and I set up again to capture some of the activity I had seen earlier in the day. The other change I made was in processing. I stacked my files in Autostakkert 3 as usual but rather revert to ImPPG I used PixInsight drawing on three different RangeMasks to protect the main disc, prominences and background. Though I am not a fan of adding colour (I think it takes away some of the detail) I grabbed a can of Jaffa Cake orange and daubed it liberally where I could. Image 1 - Full disc revealing the main activity in H⍺. 15% of the best 1,000 frames used. Exposure time 2.3 ms, Gain 0. Image 2 - Previous postings here suggested a Plage area on the North East limb. It was evident in the morning but not so much later in the evening. Activity can still be seen. 10% of the best 1,000 frames used. Exposure time 10.4 ms, Gain 60. 3x Barlow used. Image 3 - Switching over to the North West limb we have AR12833. It has been cloudy the last 7 days so it was nice to finally see this one. Nice filament on view and a great prom too. 10% of the best 1,000 frames used. Exposure time 11.4 ms, Gain 65. 3x Barlow used. Images 4 & 5 - A broken pyramid prominence was on show on the North East limb measuring in around the 100,000 km mark in height. Exposure time 35 ms, gain 180. 15% of the best 600 frames stacked. 5x Powermate used. Images 6 & 7 - My favourite prom to date is this Anomalous Prominence on the North West limb. Lots of activity here and I enjoyed watching this for awhile. 15% of the best 600 frames stacked. Exposure time 35 ms, Gain 180. 5x Powermate used. That’s all I have for today. All the best, John

Cracking image, though I think you took this in June!

This last week the weather has me kicking my heels so I decided to have a look through some recent data and was surprised to see that I had eight consecutive days of solar imaging at the start of June. Not only that, AR12829 featured in most of the captures so I wanted to share this little montage showing its evolution. Images 1 & 2 - 3 June 2021 - AR12829 makes an appearance on the eastern limb. Just a single spot on show. Classification HRX - a unipolar sunspot. Image 3 - 4 June 2021 - A close up using a 5x Powermate. A bit of a noisy picture but nice to catch a flare building up. Classification CRO - an open bi-polar sunspot group with one spot having a pnumbra. Possibly 4 or maybe 5 spots on show. Images 4 & 5 - 5 June 2021 - AR12829 ‘inverted’ to bring out the detail of the filament to its lower left. Classification now CAO. Still an open grouping. Images 6 & 7 - 6 June 2021. At 06.43 we have a classification of CRO - still a bi-polar grouping with a rudimentary penumbra around the largest spot (left side of disc). A close up using a 3x Barlow is shown in image 7. Image 8 - 7 June 2021. Still classified as CRO, however, the eastern spot is more developed. Image 9 - 8 June 2021 - Classification has changed to DSO, a bi-polar sun spot group with a penumbra at both ends (not clearly visible here) also the region looks more symmetrical about the vertical. Image 10 - 9 June 2021. A rush of blood to the head and armed with a Grade C in CSE Art I decided to throw a tin of paint at the poor thing. Still classified as DSO. Image 11 - 10 June 2021. AR12829 shows little difference to the previous day, still classified as DSO. Enjoy your day. John

Wonderful detail.

Hi Rusted, not sure this will help but it could prove useful. 1) Before I use PIPP, I align the individual images in ImPPG. Open ImPPG > Select ‘Tools’ then ‘Align Image Sequence’. Select ‘Add files’ then choose the images files. I leave it at ‘Crop to intersection’ and ‘Stabilise high-contrast features’ then choose where I want to to save the aligned files. Hit ‘Start Processing’. 2) Open PIPP, Make sure the ‘Image Files’ tab is selected and click ‘add image files’. Choose the ones saved from ImPPG. It should come produce a pop up to say it will use ‘Join Mode’. 3) Next go to the ‘Animation Options’ tab. Here I either leave it as is or select the option to ‘Reverse Play’. Sometimes its good to see it run forward and backwards, sometimes its just too confusing! 4) Moving on to the ‘Output Options’ here I choose ‘Animated Gif’ as the output format, choose your directory where the Gif is to be saved and any sub directory (I tend to not use a sub directory). 5) Staying on the ‘Output Options’ tab, having selected ‘Animated Gif’ you then have options on the right hand side. I select ‘Loop frames repeatedly’ and then change the frame rate from 3.0 to 15 or maybe longer, say 20 (personal taste). 6) Then it is off to the ‘Do Processing’ tab. Ensure that the ‘Open output folder when complete’ is selected so you can view the Gif file and hit ‘Start Processing’. When I open the Gif on my PC desktop it starts straight away. However, on my mac it doesn’t and I just get a still image. With both PC and mac I found that if I right click on the file and select ‘Open with' then choose my web browser it works ok. It might be just this last bit that you need to do. Good luck, John

Thank you Rusted. Are you going to give an animation a go soon? Clouded out these last few days but hopefully the clear skies will return soon. John

Great stuff. I was inspired to check out the ISS tracing sight and there’s a small window, clouds permitting in the next few days. Be interesting to see if there’s any software to track the China space station as well as it expands.

Nice captures. How do you get on with the mount locking on to the Sun? I have the same mount and I find if I switch on my laptop first the mount might as well look for Lord Lucan. If my laptop is off before the mount searches for the Sun I have no issues. Weird.

Clear and sharp Rusted. Wish I could get that up close and personal with the Sun 👍

Finally, I have caught up with all my Solar data. I have been burning the candle at both ends using my RC8 during the night time on a DSO project I am working on then switching to solar imaging during the day. The clouds now surrounding me are a welcome respite. 16 June 2021 has AR12833 as the only major source of activity, however, the prominences were superb once again and so here is a summary of my session. Images 1 & 2 - AR12833 classified HSX. The first is taken using a 2.5x Powermate and rotated to horizontal. The second is taken using a 3x barlow showing its true position on the disc (East to the left, North up). Images 3 & 4 - Prominence on the North East limb and estimate of its height. Images 5 & 6 - Prominence on the North West limb and another estimate of its height. Images 7 & 8 - A lovely prominence on the South West limb. For some reason I seem to find some really good proms in this area. Well, we may as well throw in some moving parts too.... North West Prom appear to be doing the ‘twist' - Of course we can’t leave out that beautiful South West prom - Have a good weekend all. John

Thanks. Btw thank you for your YouTube videos on collimating an RC8. Came in very handy. John

After a short break imaging the Sun, I picked up the scope again on 12th June which was a partly cloudy day but warm at 22 ℃ and rising. There were constant interruptions due to cloud moving in and out of view and no real flow to the session. Also the disc offered little of interest and only one prominence of note was on view. Images 1 & 2 - AR12832 (classified as BXO) was nearing the North West limb. Some small filaments were nearby. Presented here in two flavours. Images 3 & 4 - The full solar disc, inverted in ImPPG using the curves tool to show off the prominences. Black and white and ‘Jaffa Cake’ orange options available. Image 5 & 6 - Close up of the prominence on the South West limb and an estimate of its height. The forecast for this weekend is rain, rain and more rain so I hope you have clearer skies and have a fun one. John

Thursday morning started with a clear sky so I was up early to set my gear up and capture some of the early morning events on the Sun. The forecast was for clouds and I just hoped that it would stay clear enough so I could watch the partial eclipse unfold. As many of you experienced, that was not to be the case. So here is a selection of images which captures the day for me; Image 1- Small prominence on the north west limb. Exposure 18 ms, Gain = 210. 600 frames captured, best 25% stacked. Image 2 - Impressive prominence on the south west limb. Capture details are the same as Image 1. Image 3 & 4 - Close up of AR12832, a small active area north of the disc centre. Exposure 11 ms, Gain = 45. 1,000 frames captured, best 25% stacked. Image 5 - AR12829 now close to the south west limb. Exposure 13 ms, Gain 30. 1,000 frames captured, best 25% stacked. Image 6 - Full disc of the Sun taken at 08:34 UT. Exposure 2.5ms, Gain = 0. 1,000 frames, best 25% stacked. Image 7 - A still shot of the eclipse underway, taken at 09:38 UT. Exposure 2ms, Gain = 0. 500 frames, best 25% stacked. Finally, the partial eclipse itself. 62 frames taken between 09:10 and 10:04 UT with a 30 s gap between each. Some frames have been removed as cloud started to move in. Have good day all.

Lovely detail in there.

As I looked through my data for 9 June the Chromosphere activity I had captured was the usual AR12829 and by now it is heading towards the western limb so moving into the ‘shadow’ of the disc. There was a small active area with no sun spot north-centre of the disc but not much else to grab the attention. There are some nice prominences so I paid them more attention and captured the larger offerings on show. Purely by accident I captured a number of prominences both in the morning and later in the afternoon allowing us to see the evolution over 9 or so hours. Image 1 - Detached prominence on the Eastern Limb. Image 2 - Prominence on the North West limb captured at 06 43. Image 3 - Evolution of image 2, same prominence now at 16 02. Image 4 - Prominence on the South West limb at 06 38. Image 5 - Evolution of image 4, same prominence now at 16 03. Finally, a short time-lapse of Image 2. Enjoy the rest of your day. P.s. In for a penny, in for a pound.....a few Chromosphere shots too; AR12829 heading towards the western limb Small plage area north of centre

The morning started with a lot of haze, warm with a temperature of 19℃ with the wind coming in from the South West at 4 mph and 75% humidity. Below are three images taken that morning; The usual full disc showing AR12829. 3 ms exposure, gain = 0. Best 25% of 1,000 frames. A close up using a 3x Barlow of AR12829. 9.5 ms exposure, gain = 80. Best 25% of 1,000 frames. Prominence located on the south west limb of the disc. 20 ms exposure, gain = 190. Best 25% of 500 frames. Full disc and AR12829 calibrated with 50 flat frames.