20060723 Full disc H-alpha solar

Aperture blocked, I guess only 30mm used:



Tmax is not adjusted but left in closed position without tilting, the hotspot is reduced.

==
Other notes:

On trying to locate the sun, I tried to project the sun on the wall and it does so without problem, it also shows that part of the aperture is blocked and by how much.

20060722 Home@Walnut M4 again

Transparency is quite good again, so tried to capture M4 again with longer exposure at 18.1s each frame, low gain at 300 at first and then ~350.

Total 110 frames captured lasted for 33.12 minutes.



Redo using registax with its derotation function:-



Both the M4 and NGC 6144 is more resolved and well defined.

20060720 Home@Walnut star trail

DMK 31AF03, Fujinon C mount f=25mm f/1.4, non-tracking tripod, 5.1s exposure each individual frames, ~420 frames.

Other than light pollution, we have plane pollution too.



Plane removed but gap revealed:



First time star trail! It's always fun to take it inside my urban center home!

The video:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7811356707282345005&hl=en

Simplest remote observation

I have done something this morning in the hope to reduce the light leakage of the cheapy webcam, its lens is covered with Baader solar filter, with it's clamp mounted on the window frame.

The orientation seems bad, so nothing could be seem, blocked by the window frame too. I believe the bright patch at the upper right corner could be the sun, but it's hard to be certain.

I wonder if a very wide field lens is used in this setup, will I be able to skip the tracking/slewing part entirely, despite the small image scale.



another image taken a bit later, note that the time stamp is wrong, probably due to the fact that my home PC has its battery ran out on the motherboard, but the time difference between is accurate.

20060709

Thin cloud + thick cloud coming and going, SM40/BF10/Ranger/DMK 31AF03:



Full disc full size:

1st of July 2006

Tried to locate M4 from my home, successfully do it but since the sky is very light polluted, exposure is insufficient to reveal the detail, and the image scale is not enough to resolve stars, so nothing except a fuzzy patch of light.

DMK, 70mm f/1.8 c mount lens.



Post-remarks

8.5s exposure, excessive cloud killed most of the 140 frames gathered, only 7 frames stacked, cropped and 80% resized. Bright Antares at the bottom and less bright star Sigma Scorpius on top left. NGC 6144 is detected near Antares as a fuzzy patch of light.

M4 is never visually observed from my home, but so easily revealed with 8.5s exposure at f/1.8!