The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
There is some good sun activity lately and I thought I’s have a look for sunspots, partly as a rehearsal for shooting the annular eclipse in October.
Specific Feedback
All comments welcome! This is just purely a technical thing, to see how well I could do with my current gear compared to a real solar telescope. I was pleased to be able to dig out some of the surface detail.
Technical Details
The main adjustments were in LR, Texture, Clarity and Dehaze. Into PS for NR in the black sky. Cropped to 20% of the full frame.
For comparison, here is today’s picture from www.SpaceWeather.com. (I hope it’s Ok to post a screenshot from it.) I don’t know when it was taken, or where, but the sun has rotated about 90 degrees. And of course this is from a specialized solar telescope.
Ok, I missed this the first time around. Am now sifting through the No Replies group. How the HECK do you photograph the sun?
No, no. Never mind. I don’t want to know, but a person can’t even LOOK at it, never mind try this. Specialized equipment for sure and I’m always gob smacked at how basically regular folk can get this kind of image with just regular gear. I use regular loosely, but you know what I mean. Sunspots. Jeez. Just wonderful in a slightly eerie kind of way. To know all that energy and violence is going on up there…
Thanks, @Kris_Smith! Astro/Nightscape doesn’t seem to get many looks. But this is really just plain, regular stuff. Just pop a good solar filter on the lens. Search for solar filters and you’ll get a lot of options. There are thin metallic sheets that you can stretch over the lens and hold on with a rubber band, but significant wrinkles will trash the image and if you get a tear or pinhole you will damage the camera. There is good info on Thousand Oaks Optical. You can focus as usual and tweaking around with manual exposure works fine. Anything but the sun will be completely black, due to its incredible brightness.
You can get solar glasses for watching the partial phases of eclipses but the filters for cameras are more sophisticated and better quality. You need to block UV and IR as well as attenuate visible.
I’ll be driving to NW Nevada for the annular eclipse Oct 14. (My private pilot will be at the cleverly-named “Beech Party” in TN.)
