Galileo's Camera

Sunspot group AR2209

A giant sunspot group, AR2192, has formed on the sun again, and the group is now larger than the largest sunspot group we saw last year, making this the biggest sunspot group in the decade. AR2192 - 500mm Samyang Mirror Lens, Baader Solar Filter If you would like to know how big this really is, have a look at this image done by Paul Floyd at nightskyonline.info Copyright - Paul Floyd / nightskyonline.info The images below show my own images comparing the previous holder of the largest sunspot group of the decade that erupted last year: The group has caused several flares already, but there hasn't been any coronal mass ejections. A coronal mass ejection would pretty much guarantee that there would be massive auroral activity.

The year 2014 started off with a discovery of a giant sunspot group later named AR1944. NASA stated that the group was one of the largest seen in the last nine years. Out of pure coincidence, I managed to capture an image of the group on 5th Jan and I repeated the exercise today after learning that I caught an image of a fairly important activity. The two images are shown above side-by-side for comparison. (The "cutoff" of the solar disc is not due to a bad crop. The Sun is too large to be photographed via a NexStar4SE and a 550D without a focal reducer, it is just just a little bit larger than the CCD). At the time, predictions were on that there could be a massive solar flare, heightened aurora activity and a disruption to electronics including satellite communication and navigation systems. On 7th January, an X class solar flare erupted and reached Earth around 9th and 10th. Although there are no reports of communication disruptions, everybody is expecting the...

I noticed quite late that we are going to have another Venus - Solar transit in a few days and that is going to be the last Venus transit for almost a century. I have not done any serious solar viewing or photography before this. But the rarity of the event and the equipment I have now wants me to take a shot at it. It goes without saying that you need a solar filter. Over here in in SL, they are a bit too hard to come by. Previously when I was photographing and viewing the annular solar eclipse in 2010, I used a cut up x-ray film with my Canon S2IS (this method is debated). The problem this time is that I now have a Canon 550D, whose lenses have a much larger aperture and the original x-ray cut ups wouldn't work anymore. 1st attempt: Use a type of coloured cellophane that is available over here as a filter. A single sheet is way too thin so tried stacking up about 10-12 on each other. However it diffuses the light so much that it is barely of any use. 2nd attempt: Center the...