First attempt at H-Alpha imaging

[wolfgang.f]

I managed to get hold of a 2nd hand Coronado PST. Visually, it turned out to be a fascinating instrument which showed many details on the sun. Which tempted me to have a go at imaging.

Since prime focus imaging isn't possible with this scope, I tried eyepiece projection (Baader Hyperion Zoom 8-24mm 000@ 20mm, Canon EOS 1000D).

The results were.... lets say, rather disappointing. Despite live view on the notebook screen, it was very difficult to get into focus. The live view picture showed hardly any details on the sun, although they were easy to make out during visual observation. I played around with focus, the tuning ring for the etalon and different exposure times.

In the end, only 3 out of 50 images showed a bit of detail. I attached two of them to this post:

#1 processed colour image

#2 red channel only, greyscale, contrast enhanced

With some good will, you can make out a bit of structure ;-), but there isn't really much to see. Any idea how to get better results?

Wolfgang

[ollypenrice]

Is the camera modified? If not it has very low sensitivity in the Ha bandpass of the PST.

That said, your second image (the mono) shows a nice filament.

In order to get the proms you will probably need to grossly overexpose the disc and then use layers in Photoshop to superimpose the proms on the disc. I put the overexposed image on top, use magnetic lasso to select the burned out disc, feather of 5 pixels, then erasor to remove the disc.

I am only a solar newbie so I can't say any more than that. I'm using a DMK21 for my efforts.

The Sun - ollypenrice's Photos

Olly

[Merlin66]

It is possible to add a barlow lens and get a minimum amplification ratio; just enough to through the focus out to the 55mm required by the DSLR...

EDIT: found the link!

http://sweiller.free.fr/ATM/PST-EOS.html

[wolfgang.f]

Thanks for your advice! Let's see if I can get this sorted out...

Wolfgang