Annular Eclipse with Hydrogen-Alpha Filter

Image Critiques Nightscape & Astro Critiques
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Totality.jpg
Totality.jpg1024Ă—1024 49 KB

Full Sun.jpg
Full Sun.jpg1024Ă—1024 163 KB

Full view of sun prior to totality.

Critique Style Requested: Standard

The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.

Description

What a day! I drove about 4 hours from NV to UT to be in the path of totality. A few clouds in the morning caused a scare, but were more of a quick nuisance and were gone before the main event!

This was my first attempt at an annular eclipse, and also first attempt with my Lunt 80mm hydrogen-alpha solar telescope. I have used the telescope a million times for visual observation, and a few times playing around imaging closeups of sunspots and prominences, but have never tried a “serious” image before. As such, I was a bit nervous for such a big event, but I wanted something different than the normal white light filtered images. My gamble seems to have paid off!

Specific Feedback

I do not process images with my hydrogen-alpha telescope very often. Please provide any feedback you have.

Specifically, I struggled with the outer edge of the sun and moon, having a white/bright circle around them. I blended two versions of the image together, adjusting the curves to minimize the harshness.

I also want your feedback as to whether the color and contrast of the sun is acceptable. While I was imaging with a color camera, I did convert to B&W at one point to help bring out the contrast and then added color back in.

Technical Details

Telescope: Lunt 80mm Hydrogen-Alpha
Camera: ZWO ASI6200MC
Mount: Pegasus Nyx-101
Capture Software: SharpCap
Processing Software: ImPPG, Pixinsight, Photoshop

Exposure: 8ms
Gain: 316
Frame Rate: 125fps
Single image, not a stack

1 Like
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Wow!! That is a great combination of scope and camera, not to mention processing! What a fantastic capture of the eclipse!! And the surface detail on the one before the eclipse started is amazing!

I think you could adjust colors any way you want – probably most people expect more of a yellow/orange cast, but with filters there is so much leeway.

I see this is your first post – it would be great to introduce yourself to everyone with another image! I hope you’ll find this a good place to hang out!

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@Diane_Miller , thanks! The ASI6200MC is great for DSOs, and I was a bit nervous using it for solar since it is slow compared to my ASI678MC, but it worked! My ASI678MC is too small a sensor for a full view of the sun.

Thank you for the encouragement to post more photos! I will do so in the upcoming days…just have ot decide which ones to post!

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Kyle,

This is an amazing photograph of the sun and annular eclipse. I am surprised how the sun before the eclipse was rendered. Usually, the sun exhibits limb darkening at the chromosphere, like it did here. Does the H-alpha filter play a role in that? Looking forward to more of your work.

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@Youssef_Ismail, I inverted the curve in ImPPG which is why the limb darkening is showing brightening in this case.

The reason I inverted the curve was to help bring out contrast in the sunspots & filaments. It is a trick I learned from a user on Cloudy Nights.

I am not at my computer I edited the image on to show you a screenshot, but hopefully this made sense?