ScouseSpaceCadet

Fantastic colours. Lovely pics! 👍

Brilliant. 👍 I was standing by last night with a newly acquired used 80-200mm dslr lens. Unfortunately clouds arrived in the west around 10pm. 🙄

This thread has it all; dreadful gloom, excitement, joy and disappointment... I'm exhausted reading it through. 😉 To those who missed it, I feel your pain. That was a close call for a few of us it seems. For those who caught the event and even managed some special images. Congrats. I can imagine Patrick Moore's excited commentary now, "Here it is", "No it isn't", "Ah yes, yes it's... no.", "Finally, a wonderfully silhouetted lunar li... no it's gone again.", "Well viewers that's British astronomy for you.", "Great fun isn't it!". 🧐👍

Mark you made my dodgy smart phone pics feel a little more valuable. After looking properly, the cratered lunar limb is quite well silhouetted against the solar disc! 👍

Great pics Stu and everyone else. Wookie I like yours. Very atmospheric! Strangely I heard several dogs barking together... Coincidence?

The end.... Took longer to align than set up but I'm grateful for twenty minutes and a dodgy smartphone pic. 😁

Brief cloud. More blue on the way. Managed to set up Skymax 102 fantastically fast. Lol. Quick snap,

Haha!!! WOOHOO. Sky cleared, eclipse glasses on. Perfect! 😄😁😀

Now... A potential glimpse at approx 11.30...

Haha! The thickest grey cloud for 10-14 days is sitting right over me and won't be moving anytime soon. I just hope it at least doesn't rain so I can make the most of the annual leave to get some heavy weight gardening done. Those of you with clear skies. Enjoy. 👍

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/forecast/gcmzuwz73#?date=2021-06-10 Looks OK to me. Very similar to Weather&Radar. Paul you're 15mins drive from me I can't see the weather being massively different. CO has been way out for a while. Hopefully on this occasion it's wrong for the better!

The Weather Radar app states 17°c, partly cloudly with a 20% chance of rain and 10mph winds, so no need to start dooming and glooming just yet. I've booked the day off too. That forecast is quite favourable.

The ES eyepieces have been bought by members here at a knock down price from vendors on Aliexpress. I almost did the same but just didn't want to take what I perceived as a risk, hence picking up the Altair UFF 24mm. The best ep in my collection undoubtedly. The only downside being the bulk. It's a whopper 1.25in eyepiece.

Quoting myself but as a slight warning... Anyone thinking of getting one of these for a <4" aperture scope from astroshop maybe call first. I ordered the small size 80-100mm version. This filter is a 4"-7" unit in a bag marked 80mm-100mm. Luckily I have two 4" scopes so it fitted and worked despite looking a bit silly...

Fantastic!

Amazing!

Great Kon. I posted elsewhere today that I managed my first solar session. Actually aligning to the sun took a bit of doing and tbh I was wincing expecting to be blinded any second! However, the anxiety I felt was unnecessary and nearly two hours were spent having a look. After starting with a 32mm plossl and trying an OVL zoom, I switched to the Altair 24mm. The 1.25" Altair UFF 24mm 65° ep, Skymax 102 and ES Sun Catcher filter provided a magnificent view. Almost 3D I thought. A special first. Being too busy gawping the DSLR stayed packed and a Samsung S6 was used.

The Skymax 102 proved worthy today. A fantastic view, beautifully framed through an Altair UFF 24mm. My very first time solar observing. With a pink neck and shins to prove it! 😄 I found hand held smart phone photography a touch tricky... The pic doesn't do the view justice tbh

An Explore Scientific Sun Catcher Filter & eclipse glasses delivered to the UK. No fuss, no extra hidden charges or taxes and fast delivery. Thanks!

Besides the Iphone, another fine example of what can be done with cheap equipment. Nice one. 👍

Prepped for very amateur solar... From Astroshop.eu an ES Sun Catcher filter and Omegon eclipse specs. From Ebay, a Svbony solar finder...

I feel vindicated Stu thanks. The planet isn't ruined. The grass is growing nicely and many more flowering plants have gone in since. The insects prefer it I think. The garden's like an invertebrate Jurassic Park!

Yes. Besides totally obscuring the west and a chunk of zenith, two massive Leylandii were also sucking up water and ruining the lawn. Unfortunately I underestimated how much they blocked a nasty sideways shining LED street lamp, resulting in me spending £££ on an extra high new rear fence and a year wrangling with the council until a light shield was fitted. So be careful. 😉

So true. There's pleasure to be had in not setting up gear, planning targets or making notes and just sweeping the sky. Besides the Messiers, Ste 1 and Cr399 the clusters observed were identified after the session. I'm camping solo in North Wales during an August weekend hoping for a treat. Fingers crossed for clear nights!

As above. I expected a re-hash of old footage interspersed with thoughtful expressions, lingering looks and existential whimsy. That's what we got, but Cox is always worth a watch. I do wonder if he keeps an oil painting of himself hidden in the loft? 😄