The good people at Sky at Night magazine selected one of my Lunar mosaics for their May 2015 winner of the Hotshots competition.
Well chuffed, thanks guys!
Well chuffed, thanks guys!
|
Woke up to a nice little surpise this morning. Thank you AAPOD for choosing my image. :)  I took a few different Jupiter videos last night before bad weather rolled in and in the end am quite happy with what my humble little setup produced in less than ideal conditions. Below is one taken with my 6" skywatcher newt, x2 barlow and ASI120mm camera and also are the individual RGB channels.   22 panel mosaic of the Sun in Hydrogen Alpha This image I took on the 5/4/15 and is composed of 22 individual frames joined together to create the full solar disc. This was taken with a modded PST and the camera was a DMK41.   Image credit NASA from the http://www.svalbard2015.no/pages/eclipse.html website. Next month on March the 20th we will be treated to a total solar eclipse with the main path of the eclipse being over the Faroe Islands and Svalbard in Norway. For the rest of Europe, Greenland, parts of northern Africa and Asia we will be able to enjoy viewing a partial eclipse. Totality will occur at 9:45amUTC and last for 2 minutes and 47 seconds and depending on your location the first contact starts at 7:41amUTC and the even should be finished by 11:51amUTC. A good website to work out timings for your location is http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/solar/2015-march-20 The below image image shows the eclipse path. Full image credit goes to www.timeanddate.com  The area in red will be seeing the total solar eclipse. Dark Orange, More than 90% of the sun is covered. Orange, Up to 90% of the sun is covered. Light Orange, Up to 40% of the sun is covered. With the white areas the Eclipse is not visible at all. Safety Information WARNING: Never look directly at the Sun without eye protection and proper filters! Eye safety during an eclipse or any time you wish to view the Sun is extremely important, after all you only have one set of eyes so you don't want to damage them. Using some sensible precautions viewing an eclipse can be quite easy and safe for everybody young and old. One of the easiest, cheapest and safest ways is to make a pinhole projector. This is a great way to get kids involved and all that is required are two pieces of cardboard and something to make a small hole in one of those pieces. Instructions can be found here http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/make-pinhole-projector.html Tree foliage can also act as a natural projector so keep an eye out for the shadow cast by tree branches and you may just see a lot of little mini eclipses, again something fun to get kids involved. Another cheap and safe method is to use a pair of solar eclipse glasses, these can be ordered online through any good telescope retailer for a small amount and even may be given away free at out reach or club public viewing events, check your local astro magazines as well. For those who wish to view the eclipse using their telescopes then the easiest and safest method is to use an authorized solar filter, again these can be ordered from local retailers and can span a wide range of price brackets. I recommend using Baader Solar Film. One tip though is to make sure you either cover your finder scope with a filter or replace the cap as if left uncovered it will become a fire hazard. All in all viewing an eclipse can be a fun and enjoyable time for everybody and pending the weather I do really hope you can get to see it. Below is a setup of mine from the last partial eclipse that is the same as I will be using this time around.  This event was actually an occultation of Saturn and the Moon but due to some thin clouds, daylight and the very low to the horizon position of the Moon by the time I had located it the occultation had finished. I did still manage to get an image of the pair in the same field of view which is a first for myself. Taken on the 25/10/14 with a Skywatcher 150PL and ZWO ASI120mm   Hi all!
Just a quick posting to tell you about the all new 'Solar Astro Images' group on flickr. I had noticed that whilst there were many astronomy related groups there is a lack of good strictly Solar images groups so thought it was time to start one. Please join this growing photo sharing group to post all picture related to our Sun. There are already some fantastic pictures shared with the group I would love to see more! Join here https://www.flickr.com/groups/2768395@N23/ at flickr. If you are not a flickr member then why not join now, it's free and easy! Hope to see some images shared to the group. It's been a while since my last post so just to mix things up a little here is some lightning captures from recent storms in the area.   Here is a quick inverted shot from a short session last night on Comet PANSTARRS. It was a bit hazy and not really enough subs used hence more noise than the usual mess. 
Now I know a DMK41 is not the most suited camera for planetary imaging but when it is all you have then you make do with it. I'm really happy with the results and it is producing my best Jupiter images to date albeit in mono. This was taken last night(19/3/14) with my 6" reflector, DMK41, UV/IR cut filter.  |
Archives
February 2015
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
