The Sun 24-5-08 10.46 UT

Quite sunny this morning if rather breezy and with cloud building up all the time. Managed to get a record for the day and a few afocal images. The main prom is on the NE limb and is quite faint and delicate. Other smaller proms can be seen elsewhere. Not a lot of disk activity visible.

The Sun 23-5-08 15.21 UT

Very cloudy and overcast all day. I had a single 2 minute opportunity to capture a photo and that was it for the day! No surface detail was apparent and only very small prominences scattered around the limb.

The Sun 22-5-08 7.20 UT

Poor conditions again this morning with high haze making contrast very poor. The main filament from yesterday is still there, but possibly breaking up. Three main plage active regions were visible and some very faint, but large and delicate, proms in a group on the east limb. Other proms to the west and north were very small.

The Sun 21-5-08

Taken at 13.51 UT in poor conditions through a cloudy sky. The proms were too faint to capture but the disk shows the main active regions as bright plage areas and a nice filament. There were only two visible proms at the time including a hedgerow prom on the east limb and a small flame prom in the north.

The Sun 20-5-08 6.33 UT

Another early morning observation. Plenty to see with a long filament in the SE quarter together with a spray prom on the limb. In the NE quarter there was a large hedgerow prom on the limb. Three active regions easily seen as plage. One AR region has an AR filament curving through it just west of the disks centre. Proms to the west are mostly small.

The Sun 19-5-08 6.37 UT

Managed a quick look before work this morning. Plenty of active regions visible with one nice long filament in the SE quarter and one AR with a filament through it. Proms generally pretty small.

Sun's Disk near sunset 18-5-08

Although there were brief 30 second gaps in the cloud this afternoon I basically saw nothing all day then finally around 7pm (18.09 UT) the sun popped out from under the cloud cover just before setting and I managed to get a quick record. Stacks of activity on the surface with a nice filament just off centre passing through an active region. Four active regions, 3 with plage.

Monster Prom on the east limb !!!

Wow, what a monster of a prom visible today on the east limb between 16.35 and 18.21. It is curiously formed with a right angle kink in it so that a the top part of the prom seems to be tilted back to the north as if a blast of wind had pushed it over. To the south of this one was another fainter complex prom of curling plasma strands shaped like worms. The new AR is just visible as a brightening on the surface and small spots may be forming.

Below: A later image from 18.21 UT showing how the prom has changed shape

The Sun 13-5-08 Disk and main proms

The new AR is on the SE limb now and visible (but not in these photos). Some proms at the south and east limbs.

The Sun 12-5-08 - New AR flares 10 times in 8 hours!

A new active region is coming around the east limb and announced itself by flaring 10 times in eight hours producing a number of visible Class A flare proms on the limb. I had pretty poor seeing for photography, but OK for visual. Using the GOES X-Ray flux graphs we could see when the flare proms were developing then race outside to view and photograph them. I caught three of the flares and some of the other smaller proms on the north limb in the images below.......

The 9.31 UT flare prom

The 9.50 UT flare prom

The 12.27 UT flare prom

North limb with disconnected prom

The Sun 9-5-08 - Getting quieter

Activity seems to be slowing down with nothing visible on the disk and only a few faint proms on the west and north limbs.

The Sun 8-5-08 - Disk and main proms 10.30UT

Not great seeing this morning due to a high milky haze. The main prom form yesterday's CN Sun Day is still there in the west limb and looks just as active. There are some small flare proms on the east limb and smaller stuff on the north limb. AR 993 has faded completely now.

International CN Sun Day - Prom Sequence

After the initial idea by Nick Howes, Pete Lawrence organised the first International Cloudy Nights Solar Forum Sun Day. The idea was to concentrate on one prominence and image or sketch it every half hour through the day then pool the information to create a montage. I got started about 11am and had a complete sequence from 2pm to 6pm. Les Cowley then created a superb montage of the results which can be seen at the bottom of the page here http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/2376902/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 It felt like hard work constantly imaging then processing all afternoon under a roasting 22-23 degree sun, but it was totally worth the effort and great fun.

Here is the slideshow of my prom sequence................

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v94/markwalters/Astronomy/7-5-08%20prom%20sequence%20UT/?action=view&current=7854c7fa.pbw

The Sun 6-5-08 - Many active proms

Active region 993 (SC24 high latitude) continues to underwhelm being barely more than a faint bright spot on the sun's disk and not producing any significant spots. Meanwhile the prominences are once again predominantly on the west side and very active. A fun day on the Cloudy Nights Solar Forum with Les Cowley producing sketches more or less synchronised with submissions of Pete Lawrence's high resolution videocam images. The sketches were very accurate when compared with the photos.

Tallest prominence i've ever seen !!!

The cloud finally parted at 18.15 GMT after taunting me all day with observation potential by brightening occasionally. I slapped the 10mm eyepiece in the PST and could not believe what I was seeing. On the south limb was the tallest prominence I have seen since I started observing. It arced gracefully over the limb with a slight twist at the base and two other proms either side. With cloud closing in again I hastily captured some afocal images at 1/5 sec or less to get some detail on the prom. According to the good folks on the Cloudy Nights Solar Forum...................... http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/2372807/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 this prom started off as an inconspicuous short prom and developed rapidly, doubling its length in 30 minutes then extending and fading between 16.00 and 20.00 GMT. I feel really lucky to have seen such a spectacular event.

The Sun 3-5-08

Poor seeing this morning with a high milky cloud layer, but this was clearing by 2pm. The main "filaprom" prominence was still there today with some other flare and flame prominences developing on the west limb. I decided to try out the Baader Microstage adapter to see if I could reduce hand shake in the compact digital images with the Canon Powerhot A80. It takes quite a while to get the sun centred on the LCD screen with adjustments to the platform position. The eyepiece centering is also made difficult by the requirement for different zoom positions with different eyepieces. Still, a bit of trial and error and eventually it was working OK. Some of the images are certainly sharper with this method of mounting, but others were oddly out of focus even though the camera was not moving and the 10 sec delay timer was on. Overall it is probably worth trying to use this setup more, particularly with the 6.5mm EP which requires shutter speeds of 1/5 to 1/10 sec to capture detail.

The Sun 2-5-08 - A Parade of Prominences!

Well I thought yesterday was active enough, but today the sun really put on a show with large proms all round the west limb. The main prom from yesterday was fading throughout the day whereas the prom associated with the filaments going over the limb has become a huge dynamic mass of seething plasma sending out flares in all directions. Surely this cannot be beaten tomorrow, or can it ??

The Sun 1-5-08 - Huge Prom and great seeing!

Wow - the seeing today after 10am was just superb with great clarity on the disk and limb of the sun. There is a huge hedge like prominence again on the south west limb and just to the north of it the filament group seen over the past few days is now disappearing over the limb creating a viewable "filaprom" in 3D. The seeing was that good that I risked trying out a 6.5mm eyepiece for the afocal shots at speeds of 1/5 and 1/8 sec 50 ISO and was pleasantly surprised at the detail I could pick up in the large prom. I observed on and off all day up to 5.30pm.

Here is the disk at 8.40 UT

Below - the main prominence at 9.03 UT with the filaments curving over the limb below and left.

Below - disk at the end of the observing day 16.30 UT

Below - the main prominence and filaments at 16.30 UT