The Dutch Observatory

I was ill between Christmas and New Year, spending a few days in bed.  Those of you who know me well know that I cannot function when my head is filled up with mucus.  So I only was able to make one  image in the last week of 2010 on the 28th.  Here my final image for 2010.  Not much activity and no Cak visible prominances.

the sky conditions did not improve over yesterday, so the atmosphere was pretty rough for imaging.  But snaow in the forecast for Christmas day, so i took some images again. 

Stephen came over to do some imaging.  However, the sky was very unstable and today the sun was at its lowest point in the sky.  We ended up with some images but the quality was pretty bad and I did not bother trying for some small proms.  Here my Calcium K image.

Today I noticed a few small prominances and captured a set of it.  Two images of the same surface of the sun, one normal exposed, the second inverted with the prominances added.

Wanted to experiment with the H-alpha LS50T etalon which Marie let me use.  However, I could not get it in focus with my Stellarvue 80mm.  So I resorted back to the PST-CaK and was able to make my full disc image of the sun and some closeups using a 1/2″ extension ring and a Meade 140 2x barlow.  will try some more next time the sun is out.

Today’s image of the Sun.  AR 1135 is moving towards the following limb.  No major prominances, so I did not include this activity in the image.

This morning it was clear for a while, so I could make my daily image of the Sun.  Not too much happening in CaK.  Only AR1135 in the center of the disc and a new active region seems to come from the preceding limb.  A few small prominances visible around the disc but not much activity.

Clear skies today, but the temp was 22 degrees with 20mph winds.  I wanted to grab an image from the sun quickly.  When I started capturing I realized that there was a faint but huge prominance visible in CaK.  When I finished my full sun image, I captured a close up and believed that the shape had changed in the short time, so I grabbed a few more images, until my hands had trouble operating the laptop. Once processed, I saw that I captured a CME in full swing.  Click the image for the animation of the 4 images in 5 minutes and an additional last image being 40 minutes later with no CME visible anymore. 

The sun this morning.  Very cold, 23 degrees and 25 mph winds.  AR 1131 and 1133 are still good visible.  A new sunspot seems to be developing a little NE (up and left) of AR1133.

The sky cleared for an hour early in the morning today and than clouded over again.  I decided to make closeup of AR1131 and 1133 and the structure of the umbra and penumbra can be seen quite nicely. In order to show this better I have included a normal version and an inverted verion of it.   I also observed a few good sized but relative faint prominances and a few smaller ones.