A Morning of Solar Observing

I've been overwhelmingly exhausted this past week so I really haven't been doing much other than sleeping, eating and using the bathroom.  This morning, however, we had an unusually clear, sunny sky so I decided to do some solar observing with a couple of telescopes.  I felt that I had enough energy in me to drag a couple of telescopes out of the house for a simple observing session so that is what I did.  

I had quickly decided to just make this an observing session only though.  To do a "proper" imaging session would require far more equipment including a computer and associated cables and thus would require far more energy.  This was energy I still didn't have just yet.  Honestly, I was still feeling as though I could sleep for another week before diving into anything too taxing.  My plan was to just observe the sun for about an hour or so while saving enough energy to then put everything back in storage.  (It turns out that I did not have enough energy to properly put everything away after my observing session...  which should come as no surprise.)  

I first set up a telescope to view the sun in hydrogen alpha (abbreviated as 'Ha').  That little telescope is pictured, at right.  This would allow me to observe the sun's chromosphere including prominences, filaments, plages, active regions around sunspots, and the textured bubbling plasma of the chromosphere.  Since I was trying to keep this endeavor simple, I was using a very basic manual mount and tripod.  

The first things I noticed when looking through my Ha telescope were some huge prominences.  One side of the sun's limb was showing more and bigger prominences than I had ever seen!  That was pretty impressive!  Honestly, I could have just watched these tremendous prominences slowly change shape over the next couple of hours.  

Prominences look like huge flames coming off the sun.  What appears as "flames" is really spraying plasma that shoots up from the sun at distances multiple times the diameter of Earth.  The scale is so large because the sun is so large (compared to Earth) so it appears to be moving in very slow motion.  Considering the great distances though, it really isn't happening in slow motion.  It just appears that way to us tiny little human specks in our expansive universe.  

Then I noticed a very distinct long filament and the active structure of a nearby sunspot.  The surface of the sun through this Ha filter appears a deep red with a textured, mottled look to it.  Hydrogen is actually in the red wavelength so the sun appears deep red in the Ha telescope.  The viewing was great this morning and there was plenty to observe!

At this point, I then decided to pull out one of my smaller and lighter telescopes to view the sun in white light.  This telescope, pictured at left, is my Celestron 70mm Powerseeker achromatic refractor.  Using a white light solar filter on this little beginner telescope would show me the sun's photosphere.  This would allow me to observe sunspots, faculae and granulation.  

The granulation would really be far easier to see in closeup views of the sun but it is possible to see some very fine granulation on the surface when viewing the whole disk of the sun too.  I wouldn't be looking at the sun with any big telescopes this morning so I suspected any granulation would be in the form of fine grain on the surface.  I know that if I was using one of my better solar filters, I would definitely see granulation (assuming the seeing was still very good).  At this point, however, while using this glass filter, I wasn't sure how visible the granulation would be.  

Because this small lightweight telescope has a plastic focuser on it, I chose to use one of my front-mounted Spectrum glass solar filters instead of my better Herschel wedges that are inserted into the focuser at the back end of the telescope.  The sun would heat my plastic focuser too much because the wedge solar filter is placed on the back end of the focuser whereas the glass filter cuts the sun's intensity before it even enters the front end of my telescope.  So today's white light viewing would be done with a glass solar filter.  

Other astronomers keep telling me (and telling everyone who will listen) that these glass solar filters are terrible but I absolutely disagree.  Some other brands of glass solar filters may be not-so-great but these Spectrum glass solar filters are very good indeed as can be seen in the photo below.  I find these Spectrum glass solar filters to be far superior to the more popular Baader film filters (honestly, I despise those film filters for a few very valid reasons).  I also find these Spectrum glass solar filters to be far safer than the Baader film filters (see my previous blog entry about the serious problems I have had with multiple Baader film filters).  In short, I find that the Baader film filters are the least safe filters to use for solar astronomy (dangerously so risking vision) and I simply do not like the views they provide which is all explained in detail in the linked previous blog entry.  

As you can see in my photo, below, there is plenty of visible and obvious detail in the sun's photosphere when using this Spectrum glass solar filter.  I cannot imagine anyone being disappointed with a view like this...

Even more impressive is that this is a single image rather than a stack of images.  A stack of images would produce even more detail and sharper detail but even this single snapshot shows a lot of detail.  Clearly, there are some sunspots visible...  you can see faculae (whiter surface details in areas near sunspots)...  and you can clearly see the fine grain of granulation.  Granulation is the bubbling plasma in the photosphere.  This is a really nice white light solar image!  Spectrum glass solar filters are awesome and provide great details to view but I must point out that I still prefer my solar wedge filter(s) on my better telescopes.  

I really need to get some closeup photos of granulation one of these days.  Better yet would be a time lapse video of granulation over the course of an hour or so.  You could then easily see the bubbling surface of the sun.  This is a great full disk image anyway and especially for a single image using one of these far-too-often and ignorantly maligned glass solar filters.  

My original intention was to only observe the sun this morning but the seeing was so good that I decided to take a quick snapshot of the sun in white light with one of my little Sony a6000 camera (not an astronomy camera).  This is easy to do when observing in white light...  remove the eyepiece...  insert the camera where the eyepiece normally goes...  then take a quick snapshot.  This technique is not ideal nor even preferred but at least it provides a snapshot!   

I wish I could have captured a quick snapshot of those giant prominences in Ha too.  Unfortunately, there really is no quick and easy way to get a snapshot in Ha.  Maybe next time...