Back in Business

New Routine

More than three weeks had passed since my last observing session. Almost every day had been cloudy, and the Sun had been mostly blank. Finally, on the morning of June 29th, conditions improved. The temperature was just below 80 degrees, the sky was clear, and there was no wind. That's about as good as it ever gets at this time of year.

On this rare day I continued trying to remove annoying interference fringes from images produced by my new camera. Flat fields removed vertical interference fringes, but made oval fringes worse. A tilt adjuster removed oval fringes, but didn't remove vertical fringes. Obviously, I needed both a flat field and a tilt adjuster. This combination worked! All interference fringes disappeared! So, finally, I can establish a routine for successful imaging with my new camera.

Only the Sun's eastern edge had interesting features this day. Other parts of the Sun were mostly blank. The following image is a 7-panel mosaic made with a 5X Barlow lens. It shows nice prominences on the eastern limb along with solitary sunspot 2373 which had just rotated into view.

The inverted version of the previous image highlights some pretty cloud-like filaments.

Finally, here's a close up of the prominence on the southeastern limb.

From now on I'll use a tilt adjuster and a flat field during every session. I'll also experiment with exposure times to find the best values. Observing conditions are usually horrible during July and August, however. Even when a rare cloud free day comes along it's hard to concentrate in 95 degree heat with high humidity.