Giant Filament Prominence
Giant Filament-Prominence
This giant filament prominence was visible on the SE limb on 27 Jan 2011. I made this movie at 1 minute intervals from 1816-1943 UT with the Tak 102, double stacked 75mm, and the DMK 41AU04. A new AR may be forming, and hot plage can be seen surging around a small area.
Santa Ana winds made seeing poor in the morning, but the winds died down later in the day and a decent image was obtained. Focusing was tuff at first. Why do I use a front mounted filter instead of a dedicated solar scope? Awnser: Little to no sweet spot, and the ability to integrate high grade optics into the imaging train. When I first began imaging the sun in H alpha several years ago, I used a double stacked PST with a gun decked motorized focuser. Focusing was very, very difficult. And no focus aids like a Bhatinov Mask are available for H alpha. After I upgraded to the 75mm, I used it on a Meade series 5000 80EDT. Focusing was much easier, but still needed improvement. When I upgraded to the Takahashi TSA 102, I can see the view snap into focus. With the Moonlite DC motor focus on the Tak 102, obtaining sharp images became much easier. I see a big difference in image quality of H alpha views in my high end Takahashi over the 80EDT. I think a great focus aid is good optics
