Todays clear skies brought the opportunity to do a little solar observing. Given how cold its been at night, this is a nice addition to the hobby.

I’ve almost got the focusing down for imaging. Views come quickly into focus, but through the view finder of my Sony camera, its still a bit of a struggle. This shot was the best I’d could muster in the alloted time. I’m hoping to work through the details a bit more rigorously in the coming weeks.

Anyway, here’s a trio grouped tightly together. Just to put things in perspective, each of these solar prominences are larger than our entire planet. These are some truly massive events. If you just think about the amount of matter and energy involved, it really helps to put things in perspective.

Astro Photo Details:

* Designation: The Sun
* Magnitude: roughly mag -27 * Size: roughly 1/2*

Astro Photo Processing Details

* Sony DSC-F717 Digital Camera
* 1/50s at ISO200
*PhotoShop CS2 Curves (mac version)
* Coronado Solar Max 40 Solar Telescope

Shortly after sunset on Wednesday, February the 20th, skywatchers across the Americas will be treated to a sweet total lunar eclipse. This will be the last total lunar eclipse until 2010 (so start praying for clear skies). Depending on where you live, you’ll get see all or at least most of the event. Those located to the east will see the Snow Moon rise as the Sun is setting. Shortly after that, the partial phase of the eclipse will begin. For those located in the mid-west and west, the moon will rise with the partial phase already underway. Regardless,  most everyone in the view area should be able to see all of the totality phase.

Look for the moon to turn a coppery or reddish color during totality. This is caused because the eclipse will block all direct light, but not all light. Some light will filter through Earth’s atmosphere and still shine upon the Moon. This will give it a beautiful reddish color. No special equipment is required to view a lunar eclipse. Simply head outside during the event and you will be able to enjoy it. That simple. If you have a telescope or binoculars, you might as well plan on pulling it out for the event. Wide angle views of the eclipse should be simply spectacular. Those of you looking to image the event should plan on mounting your camera on your tracking telescope or tripod. You’ll need to take exposures of as much as 2 seconds…far more than you’ll be able to hand hold. A good idea is to bracket your exposures…. ie… take a 1/2 second image… a 1 second image… and perhaps a 2 second image. Compare these to see which works best for your local conditions. Those of you still using film… might start around 1/4 second… and simply take a number of exposures for each shot you’re looking to catch. This will dramatically improve your chances of getting some nice shots.

I’m hoping to put together a post that’ll focus on imaging in more detail. Check back between now and the 20th to see it. I’ll also have a review of the event (if its visible from here).  Checkout Science@NASA for more details.  Here’s a shot I took of the last total lunar eclipse… taken this past August.

As luck would have it, skies cleared here in Park City and I got word (via Spaceweather.com) that there was a nice prominence visible on the Sun. I figured I’d take a few minutes out of a busy morning to see what all the fuss was about. Wow! What a sweet view. Not one, but two prominences jumped right out at me. Sweet! I enjoyed the view for a while and then decided that this was simply too nice not to be imaged.

This was my first success at imaging through the new scope, a Coronado Solar Max 40 solar telescope.  I’d had a couple of failed attempts previously. It seems that I need a bit more back focus than I was getting. I kept fiddling with this until I got to focus. I had to have the eyepiece pulled half way out of the diagonal before the image got sharp. I’ll pull together some sort of tube extender for my next effort. Anyway, I was quite happy to see that this actually came out close to what I was able to observe. I say close, because there was a bunch of detail on the surface of the Sun that did not appear in my image. As my target was the prominence, this wasn’t too big of a deal, but… going forward, I’ll need to get this resolved as well.

Astro Photo Details:

* Designation: The Sun
* Magnitude: roughly mag -27 * Size: roughly 1/2*

Astro Photo Processing Details

* Sony DSC-F717 Digital Camera
* 1/50s at ISO200
*PhotoShop CS2 Levels (mac version)
* Coronado Solar Max 40 Solar Telescope