White Light Overview - Saturday 3rd March

[marktownley]

A very gusty wind yesterday meant I decided to limit myself to the 70mm for taking these pics, the 127mm would have been flapping around like a sail. Still, it was nice to be outside in the sunshine! All the action yesterday was happening around the limb, and the harder you looked the more there was to see! First off, full disk - 70mm @ f11, Lunt Wedge, TiO2 filter, DMK31, 6 pane mosaic assembled in IMerge.


wl full disk by Mark Townley, on Flickr

Only hints of the granulation here, remember, only running at 70mm... I then decided to zoom in on the features of interest and switched the 1.9x barlow for the 2.5x powermate. First off, steadily departing from us were active regions 1423 & 1427...


AR1423 AR1427 by Mark Townley, on Flickr

Then the newly designated AR1428...


ar1428 by Mark Townley, on Flickr

And finally, our new monster size active region 1429, i'm sure this one is going to get plenty of attention over the coming days...


AR1429 by Mark Townley, on Flickr

Currently raining here in Brierley Hills, however are keeping my fingers crossed there's a slim chance the skies may clear late in the afternoon, if not i'll be imaging the moon later instead!

Hope you like!

Mark

[Merlin66]

Great results there!
Well done.
The TiO2 seems to work well for you...

[marktownley]

Thanks Ken! For poor seeing (which is what I get 90% of the time) the longer wavelengths it works at just cuts through the turbulent atmosphere. I get consistently better results with it than I do with the continuum filter...

[Derek Klepp]

Thanks for the pics Mark I was looking for those Tio2 filters but couldn't get the right link.Would you mind putting it up here for me. One thing I have learned from your posts and I applied it today is to stay within the limits of the seeing. Sometimes with all these new scopes I'm like a little kid with new toys.

[marktownley]

Thanks Derek!

Heres the link...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Optical-Inter ... 2311304827

You will need to mount in an old filter holder / barlow if you have one lying around...

[marktownley]

Mark, that is a great result for poor seeing!
You think that depends on the new TiO2 Filter? Wow!

Hi Cai Uso,

From my perspective the success of an image depends on a number of factors; the aperture used, focal length used and the wavelength being imaged at. I know on CN there were numerous debates going on as to which is the best wavelength to image at in WL, the problem with this question is that there isn't a single answer: For me, where I live and image, seeing is notoriouslly poor 90% of the time, as a result imaging at narrowband long wavelengths, ie TiO2 705nm, works pretty much all of time and gets decent results. I know if I try and image with the Baader continuum for 90% of the time I will get better results from the TiO2. However, on several times throughout the year when seeing is excellent where I live, experience tells me to switch to the Continuum filter and I will get better results. Imaging at shorter wavelengths has greater resolution for a given aperture...

With this in mind, this is why different people reported that different wavelength filters worked best for them... To me trick is down to guaging what is best where you are based on your own conditions and experiences.

If you look at these pics, the full disk, despite being imaged at a shorter focal length shows better detail than the shots with the powermate. This demonstrates where oversampling the image too much for conditions results in less detail, i'm treading the fine line of what seeing allows with the closeup shots... Then there's the aperture factor; I could have used the 127mm frac to get approximately the same fl as the shots with the 2.5x however experience tells me I would have got even worse results; seeing would not support that aperure on that day... I know it's been a good imaging run when i'm not throwing avis away the end because they're all soft and mushy!

Mark

[Montana]

These are a wonderful collection Mark, especially the full disc of which you are a master

Thanks for the view, I think you must have had a lot more sunshine than my 30 minutes yesterday.

Regards
Alexandra

[Merlin66]

Very good commentary re white light filters v's seeing.
Appreciated.

[astroshot]

Good sharp images Mark.

[Pedro]

Great WL images Mark. With bad seeing (and wind) you got fantastic results.

best regards

[swisswalter]

Hi Mark

those are wonderful shots, considering the seeing conditions those are fantastic shots with excellent processing