First solar images, bonus jetliner.

[MilwaukeeLion]

My inexpensive tin foil looking solar filter arrived Fri.  Slapped it on the ED80TCF today to takes some shots, pretty neat.  Had difficulty focusing until I switched over to video mode on DSLR and zoomed in.  Only then was able to see spots clear enough to get focus.  Was shooting at ISO 100, 1/4000 of sec.  Took about 40 images trying different speeds / ISO combos.  Didn't even notice the jet until looking through images in Lightroom. Don't know how to bring the prominence out or maybe I won't be able to bring it out with the film type filter I have or need to use barlow to be closer than 480mm to see prominence? Anyway was nice break from raking leaves.

Enjoy,

ML

[Drop Of Sun]

Lovely shots, ML, what a catch for your first session! Focus looks good to my eyes.

With this type of solar filter (white light), you won't see prominences. To see prominences you need a hydrogen-alpha solar telescope (like a Coronado PST or Lunt 50), or if you have a compatible refractor, something like a Coronado SolarMax Solar filter set or a Daystar Quark. The cost is unfortunately much more than white light. Also h-alpha gives a red image so although you can use a colour camera with it, ideally, you'd use a monochrome video camera. That said, I have seen some very nice DSLR h-alpha pics so don't let that put you off, it's just mono is ideal as all pixels will record the h-alpha, whereas with a colour camera, only the red pixels (1/4 of the total pixels) will.

Look forward to more pics!

PS white light and h-alpha show aspects of the sun differently so many of us into h-alpha do both.

[MarsG76]

That looks fantastic.. I always wanted to capture a jet in front of the Sun or the Moon but was never lucky enough to get it. Well done...

[Pete Presland]

That is a fine first image and a nice bonus interest object! A can only remember once seeing a plane cross the sun while i have observing/imaging and it made me jump at the time!

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Very good first shots!

[Montana]

Tremendous WL shots for a first look, for some of us it takes years to get a shot like that :)

Alexandra

[laudropb]

Very nice photos. Thanks for posting.

[Davey-T]

Excellent first go and nice plane, tried to catch some meteors the other night and all I got was endless planes 

Dave

[MilwaukeeLion]

Thank you, plain ole luck yields some of my best captures.

[Tyson M]

These WL shots are fantastic. Nice plane transit too 

[cshahar]

Wow. Very fortuitous transit.

[David Smith]

Great first white light images, well done and thanks for posting.