ol' Sol Sept 02 and have a go at some solar processing!

[Thefatkitty]

Hi all, hope things are good with you and yours

Haven't been on here a lot of late; too much going on. I'll leave it at that.

Yesterday (Thursday) I got up at the crack of 4AM to start my day. Why so early? Well, my first stop was just over an hour away, and getting down the highway early is a good thing, believe me. Plus my day is done by about 1:30PM. I'm paid for a 40-hour week; if I work that it's a miracle. I could count on one hand the amount of 40 hour weeks I've had. My weeks average 25-30 hours; I know my route and the clients very well.

I headed out at five. It was still overcast and a bit chilly (50F/9C); I actually put the heat on in the truck for the first time since March. This is my view as I'm leaving:

An hour and change later, I'm in the town of Elmira, and the Sun is coming up. The weather forecast called for clearer skies in the afternoon; I was hoping that would work out. I had checked Spaceweather.com, and there was a new spot I wanted to have a look at that literally came out of nowhere; it wasn't there the day before.

I finished in Elmira, and went to my other stops in Listowel, Arthur, Erin and Orangeville. I know, that probably means nothing to you, but in a nutshell, it's a lot of driving down mostly empty country roads. My biggest traffic is made by John Deere, though I didn't get stuck behind anything today

At about 10AM, the skies were still wispy clouds, but with a deep blue behind them. The humidity we've had for the past month was gone, and it seems so is the forest fire smoke. Haven't seen daytime skies that blue in quite some time.

I took a pic at about that time of my skies and the Moon. Maybe it's just me, but can you see an outline in the clouds which looks some animal about to eat ol' Luna? That was the first thing I saw when I looked at it. And no, I haven't had a beer yet, even though it's Friday...

Sure enough, I finished off at just before 1:30. I checked Google Maps for traffic on my usual route home from there, and all looked good. However, when I got on the highway to go south, it was noticeably slower than normal. No big deal, but I was wondering why. Well, it soon became apparent...

There was another truck about a half mile down the road carrying the same load; four tires. Tires for I'm imagining earth-moving equipment for mines. Thing is, the only mines around here is the Sudbury nickel mine, and that's the opposite direction. By the way, that now-mine is the result of a meteorite impact that is the planets third largest and the oldest crater; dating from about 1.8 billion years ago. So as to where it was going, I haven't the slightest idea.

And as you can see from my ride home, my skies are getting somewhat clearer. I got in at just after 2PM; my wife was out and so was my daughter. Fun times, just me and the cat

Of course, Sasha needed groceries. Needy feline... I fed the meowing creature, then I went and got my C80-HD, Baader solar film and camera from the basement; took all that out and got my CG4 out of the shed. Set that up, and of course her highness came out to see what I was up to. Well, I have to wait for a sucker-hole, so I appeased the furry one with a good petting.

Of course, it eventually goes from loving happiness to total anger, and soon she was off chasing cicadas. It's funny to watch a cat who's mouth is buzzing

While watching that amusement, I got a rather large break in the clouds. I took 80 shots in batches of 20 with my Canon 550D at ISO 100 and 1/250th sec exp. Just as I finished that, my wife got in, and Sarah about a half hour later.

We had dinner, then I came downstairs, processed my images with PIPP and AS3, and picked the best stack. Two days of being up at 4AM was catching up with me, so at about 8 I flicked on the TV and set the timer for an hour, and was asleep in probably 10 minutes

This afternoon I got in at 2:30ish, and processed my stack in ImPPG with some final tuning in PS 2020 with the Camera Raw filter. I then threw in the planets to scale. You can see AR2860 next to them just rotating off the disc. As for AR2863, it was a day old and I think I caught what's known as a "light-bridge". You'll have to click on the full size image to see it; it's the black line going vertically at the bottom of the spot. In four years of photographing the Sun in while-light, this is only the second one I've caught. But in all fairness, most of the past four years has been solar minimum...

Full size image here


Good times This morning I left for work at 6:30, so cool to see daylight when I left!


So here's the rest of my title. I took shots Tuesday for AR2860, and yesterday for AR2863. These were taken with my C80-HD on a manually-driven CG4 mount, Baader visual film (ND5), and a Canon EOS 550D at ISO 100 and 1/250th of a second exposure. I aligned the best 20 RAW files in PIPP, then stacked them with PIPP, and saved as a TIFF file with no compression; largest file possible

These are on my Flickr page at just over 50MB in file size and if you want, download them and have a go!!


AR2860


AR2863


I'd love to see what folks come up with, as I know I don't know everything about processing. Looking forward to your results!


Well, for me I think it's high time for a few beers, a chat with the girls, and tomorrow is another day .

All my best to you all,

[SpyderwerX]

I have no input as to processing, but I always enjoy seeing your activities and reports, Mark. And all of the great images as well. Always an enjoyable read. Thank you.


OH...Those tires could be headed across the US border, I hear tales of severe shortages and demand of specialty "construction" equipment tires here.

[Lady Fraktor]

A great read as always Mark, all the best to everyone.

[Ylem]

Thanks for the info on the crater. I don't think I remember hearing about that one.

[Lowjiber]

... This afternoon I got in at 2:30ish, and processed my stack in ImPPG with some final tuning in PS 2020 with the Camera Raw filter. I then threw in the planets to scale. You can see AR2860 next to them just rotating off the disc. As for AR2863, it was a day old and I think I caught what's known as a "light-bridge". You'll have to click on the full size image to see it; it's the black line going vertically at the bottom of the spot. In four years of photographing the Sun in while-light, this is only the second one I've caught. But in all fairness, most of the past four years has been solar minimum...





Full size image here

Excellent white light image, Mark! That is perhaps the best white-light image I've seen in several years. Good Job!!!

That is definitely a light bridge. I've often said that I'd rather be lucky than good. However, light bridges require both, and you nailed it.

Clear Skies

[helicon]

Thanks for the highly literate report Mark and congrats on your image, which is quite nice.

[Makuser]

Hello Mark. I too enjoyed your well written and fun read report. Lots of nice photos of your journey along the highways. The solar image in white light is very good, and the active region really stands out nicely. Thanks for sharing these with us Mark, and the best of wishes to you and to your family.

[Thefatkitty]

I have no input as to processing, but I always enjoy seeing your activities and reports, Mark. And all of the great images as well. Always an enjoyable read. Thank you.


OH...Those tires could be headed across the US border, I hear tales of severe shortages and demand of specialty "construction" equipment tires here.

Thanks Frankie, much appreciated Hope you're doing good. And as for the tires, I did a Google search and that might very well be where they were going!

A great read as always Mark, all the best to everyone.

Thanks Gabby, and to you and Sabin as well

Thanks for the info on the crater. I don't think I remember hearing about that one.

Home of the Big Nickel

... This afternoon I got in at 2:30ish, and processed my stack in ImPPG with some final tuning in PS 2020 with the Camera Raw filter. I then threw in the planets to scale. You can see AR2860 next to them just rotating off the disc. As for AR2863, it was a day old and I think I caught what's known as a "light-bridge". You'll have to click on the full size image to see it; it's the black line going vertically at the bottom of the spot. In four years of photographing the Sun in while-light, this is only the second one I've caught. But in all fairness, most of the past four years has been solar minimum...





Full size image here

Excellent white light image, Mark! That is perhaps the best white-light image I've seen in several years. Good Job!!!

That is definitely a light bridge. I've often said that I'd rather be lucky than good. However, light bridges require both, and you nailed it.

Clear Skies

Hey John, good to hear from you! Thanks so much for the comments, I've regarded you as a mentor and good friend since the AF days You were inspiring me since my first shots in 2017, and if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't have had any idea I caught a light-bridge back then either. I didn't even know what one was..!!

When I saw that in my image last night, my first thought was Thanks John!

All the best buddy,

Thanks for the highly literate report Mark and congrats on your image, which is quite nice.

Thanks Michael, and hope all's going well with your eventual move

Hello Mark. I too enjoyed your well written and fun read report. Lots of nice photos of your journey along the highways. The solar image in white light is very good, and the active region really stands out nicely. Thanks for sharing these with us Mark, and the best of wishes to you and to your family.

Thanks Marshall, and yes I do see a lot of interesting/different things in my days; I'm thinking of getting a dashcam

Hope you and Sheri are well, and all the best from the three of us,

[messier 111]

Thx .