May 22 2021 C1.39 flare

[LeoD]

Thanks for your kind attention, guys!

How many floors up are you observing from Leo?

I'm at 6 of 17, so closer to the grass rather to the roof and it should matters!
it's all about that seeing ... well, I would prefer a nice lawn to my narrow balcony with a limited firing sector, as the sun only appears now from 09:20.
I've no measurement of the given Quark, but it's with 2 non-uniform areas at sides of FOV, I think as usual.
I had also experience at the mountain observatory at about 2000m altitude in October last year. I imaged the sun with C11 from the 6m tower under clear skies, but finally the seenig was worse then last Saturday. Although I was surprised with SSM figures (calibration?), today SSM varied from 0,8 to 4 and pictures not of the same level.
BTW I am not the only one here in Moscow was imaging the sun last weekend with C11, at least with not the worst result.
regards
Leo

[marktownley]

I see several people on SC who regularly observe from balconies and get excellent hi-res results, maybe something to be said as a balcony as a suitable observing site...

[Carbon60]

Absolutely superb.

Stu.

[minhlead]

I see several people on SC who regularly observe from balconies and get excellent hi-res results, maybe something to be said as a balcony as a suitable observing site...

I myself observed both from ground and my observatory in the 5th floor can attest to this. The air is most turbulent in the few meter from the ground, especially if you have concrete or asphalt road that gets heated up under sunlight. But a few feet above, the hot air is spreaded over and rises more uniformly instead of making vortex/ turbulences that affect seeing. So the higher you are, the better seeing, this is especially true for solar imaging. A 3-4 story balcony that look out grassy field or a lake would be the best scenario. Just make sure you do not look through couple of meter of concrete roof if you are imaging from the roof (like me).
I have a friend who live in an 40 stories apartment building and his seeing up the roof floor looking over the fence is just superb even inside of a mega city

[Valery]

There are no magical locations on the Earth where seeing is always OK to excellent. I have specially researched where the best amateur solar images with larger apertures were taken. Very different! All types of locations:

1. From the ground (a 4-6 feets) - T.Legault, C.Viladrich, J.P. Brahic, F.Tosi, Alex (aka allhoest), Salvato, R.Shivak, S.Visser, Silveto, F.Ruviere, Val Shumakov, A. Tan, P. Zetner, S. Green, P.Hsieh and me.

2. Balcony or roof - H.Paleske, A. Bianconi, D. Makolkin, F. Jaber, M. Boximer, LeoD and me.

3. High in mountains - C.Viladrich, T. Legault, F.Jaber.

4. Pier on the sea - me.

It is easy to see, that most of these images (known to me so far) were taken from a ground. Less from balcony/roof. Even less from high moutains (just rarely used place). So, good seeing happens at all locations at all latitudes (35 - 58).

As our friend Christian Viladrich told recently: "The most important thing to get good results is the amount of time spent at the telescope".
According to my own experience, good seeing can be catched more or less often only if one really hunting for it, not passively looking for a luck. Of course, luck helps too, but it happens much less often than success with persistent hunting.
And if seeing is good for 150mm aperture it also good for 200mm and up, just less frequent during a given session.

[p_zetner]

Some spectacular imaging, Leo.
Thanks for all the details of your procedure.
Overall, a very interesting and informative thread as well.
Cheers.
Peter

[marktownley]

There are no magical locations on the Earth where seeing is always OK to excellent. I have specially researched where the best amateur solar images with larger apertures were taken. Very different! All types of locations:

1. From the ground (a 4-6 feets) - T.Legault, C.Viladrich, J.P. Brahic, F.Tosi, Alex (aka allhoest), Salvato, R.Shivak, S.Visser, Silveto, F.Ruviere, Val Shumakov, A. Tan, P. Zetner, S. Green, P.Hsieh and me.

2. Balcony or roof - H.Paleske, A. Bianconi, D. Makolkin, F. Jaber, M. Boximer, LeoD and me.

3. High in mountains - C.Viladrich, T. Legault, F.Jaber.

4. Pier on the sea - me.

It is easy to see, that most of these images (known to me so far) were taken from a ground. Less from balcony/roof. Even less from high moutains (just rarely used place). So, good seeing happens at all locations at all latitudes (35 - 58).

As our friend Christian Viladrich told recently: "The most important thing to get good results is the amount of time spent at the telescope".
According to my own experience, good seeing can be catched more or less often only if one really hunting for it, not passively looking for a luck. Of course, luck helps too, but it happens much less often than success with persistent hunting.
And if seeing is good for 150mm aperture it also good for 200mm and up, just less frequent during a given session.

And without wanting to sound 'glass half empty' the other 3000 users on this forum don't have these conditions... Just a bit of balanced perspective...

[Valery]

There are no magical locations on the Earth where seeing is always OK to excellent. I have specially researched where the best amateur solar images with larger apertures were taken. Very different! All types of locations:

1. From the ground (a 4-6 feets) - T.Legault, C.Viladrich, J.P. Brahic, F.Tosi, Alex (aka allhoest), Salvato, R.Shivak, S.Visser, Silveto, F.Ruviere, Val Shumakov, A. Tan, P. Zetner, S. Green, P.Hsieh and me.

2. Balcony or roof - H.Paleske, A. Bianconi, D. Makolkin, F. Jaber, M. Boximer, LeoD and me.

3. High in mountains - C.Viladrich, T. Legault, F.Jaber.

4. Pier on the sea - me.

It is easy to see, that most of these images (known to me so far) were taken from a ground. Less from balcony/roof. Even less from high moutains (just rarely used place). So, good seeing happens at all locations at all latitudes (35 - 58).

As our friend Christian Viladrich told recently: "The most important thing to get good results is the amount of time spent at the telescope".
According to my own experience, good seeing can be catched more or less often only if one really hunting for it, not passively looking for a luck. Of course, luck helps too, but it happens much less often than success with persistent hunting.
And if seeing is good for 150mm aperture it also good for 200mm and up, just less frequent during a given session.

And without wanting to sound 'glass half empty' the other 3000 users on this forum don't have these conditions... Just a bit of balanced perspective...

In reality you don't know what the conditions all these 3000 members have. I bet a lot of them have better conditions than mine. The main requirement in this matter is to really want to achieve this and then do it.


Valery

[AJamesB]

Wow, stunning image!

So, others have told me (and linked supporting evidence) that one has to be at least 18 meters above the ground to get above surface level seeing distortions and enjoy the best seeing possible in a given location. I wonder if you imaging from the 6th floor balcony has this same affect for you, allowing you to get above that troublesome surface level seeing, similar to an elevated observation dome?

Either way, fantastic result!

[LeoD]

Hi all,

definetely it's not the time for solar imaging at my location, I had less than 1h for visual last 2 month, but spent hours for processing of the summer raw material.
The captures of C-flare on May 22, at first glance, were not suitable for animation because of the exposure difference, uneven intervals, numbers of frames to stack, alignment of different areas of frames etc. Therefore, I had to tinker in Photoshop with rotation correction, artifacts fix in the corners on several stacks to wider final fov, in Pixinsight to balance histograms using a script. Vladimir @Csve also helped me a lot with his algorithm for generating subframes for smooth playback.
Total 21 original frames in the animation, 09:49-10:17 UTC+3 (Moscow).
You can see coloured .gif lile and images as versions at my Astrobin
https://www.astrobin.com/mhs589/
As the gif is too heavy to attach, here is 2.3M video preview with some more dithering/noise

regards
Leo

[Montana]

Oh my goodness!!!! you are giving SDO a run for its money



Alexandra

[Valery]

Absolutely fantastic solar flare movie! Congrats, Leonid!


Valery

[christian viladrich]

Very impressive Leo !! Thanks for sharing.

[LeoD]

Thanks for your kind comments, Alexandra, Valery and Christian! Very appreciated!
regards
Leo

[marktownley]

A very nice addition there Leo!