​I was lucky to captured some pictures of the Sun before cloud rolled in late this afternoon.

Looking through the (Ha) Lunt solar telescope there were quite a lot of filaments on the surface plus some nice prominences around the limb

Through the white light refractor you could Sunspot groups AR3483 & AR3477 very clearly heading toward the western limb.
 
White light image taken with 80mm Skywatcher telescope fitted with a glass solar filter and Canon 700D camera, exposure time was 1/500th second and ISO200.
 
(Ha) image taken with 60mm Lunt solar telescope and Canon 700D camera, exposure time was 1/320th second, ISO200 for disc and 1/25th second and ISO 200 for faint prominences, images stacked in RegiStax6 and combined in PS.

The Sun is very quite on the surface at the moment with only a couple of very small sunspots as seen looking through my white light telescope. But looking through the Lunt (Ha) solar telescope was Wow… on show were dark filaments, prominences around the limb and a little bit of activity around that small sunspot AR 3372 :-)
 
White light image taken with 80mm Skywatcher telescope and Canon 700D camera, (Ha) image taken with 60mm Lunt solar telescope and Canon 700D camera, images stacked in RegiStax6 and processed in PS.

The Sun looked awesome with these two large sunspots AR3372 & AR 3363 on the solar surface. There was another active region coming into view on the eastern limb that’s now designated AR 3373.

Images were taken with an Orion 80mm refractor telescope and a Canon 700D camera, I used  a 2x Barlow lens for the full disc and 5x Barlow lens for the close up view of the sunspots. 

​A glass solar filter was attached to the telescope lens for safe imaging and viewing of the Sun :-)

We had a lovely clear sunny day today and I managed to capture some pictures of this very dark inky black sunspot that looks like the shape of an old fashion keyhole, I wonder what it’s going to do over the next couple of days!
 
Images taken on the 8th July 2023 with Canon 70D camera plus a Canon 100-400mm lens fitted with a 2x teleconverter lens with a glass solar filter attached. Twenty images captured with an exposure time 1/500th second and ISO200, stacked in Registak6 and processed in PS.

​Wow :-o  this huge sunspot is just spectacular!
​
 Images taken with a Canon 70D camera plus a Canon 100-400mm lens fitted with a 2x tele converter and a glass solar filter, making a focal length of 1280mm. Twenty images were captured with an exposure time 1/640th second and ISO200, stacked in Registack6 and processes in PS.

Giant sunspot AR 3354 has a 'beta-gamma-delta' class magnetic field that harbours energy for X-class solar flares. (From information on Spacewether.com on the 1st July 2023)

Live view of this huge Sunspot (AR 3354) as seen through my camera and lens on Movie mode, it’s a very big sunspot nearly 10 times the diameter of our Earth…Wow!

It was such a beautiful clear day here today that I just had to take some pictures of our Sun :-)

My images were taken with a Canon 70D camera and a Canon 100-400mm lens with 2x tele converter, 20 images were captured and stacked in RegiStax6 and processed in PS CS4.

​Exposure time was 1/500th second and ISO200.

It was all very exciting to get on a plane in Brisbane, fly to Perth and board a cruise ship just to get under the shadow of the Moon, I think Graham and I are now true eclipse chasers along with a couple of our fellow SAS members.
 
The ship provided plenty of excellent astronomy presentations from members of the Australian Society of Australia (ASA) but what we really wanted to see would happen on the morning of the 20th April if the weather stayed nice and clear. Kelly Beatty from Sky & Telescope was working with the Captain to find us a safe anchorage so the ship would be stable enough for all on board to view and take pictures of the event.
 
The Captain did a wonderful job of positioning the ship and anchored in the Exmouth Gulf just off the mainland, being on a moving surface did present its own set of problems, but excuse the pun…we were all in the same boat!
 
Cheesy brought along his telescope to image the event and spend days worrying about how he was going to take his images, but in the end he got some amazing photos of the eclipse. Belinda and Warren also set up on the ships deck not far away from me and got some awesome images.
 
You never know what’s going to happen on the day, I was all set up with my gear on the back deck and was really getting carried away with the atmosphere of the event. I left my setup a few times to go exploring to see what other people were doing, what I saw were so many families waiting patiently and excitingly to see the eclipse with all sorts of equipment to capture some pictures.
 
I came across sunlight breaking through tiny holes in the banisters of the ship that produced little crescent Suns on the deck, I also saw this weird shimmering effect in front of me just before totality and was so thrilled to be seeing what’s known as shadow bands, I took a small movie as it’s quite rare to capture, Yay!
 
I got back to my camera just a few minutes before totality and that’s when somebody called out look at the Moons shadow path!!! I looked behind me and saw this shadow race over us and across the water, it was so fast, when I looked back in front of me and up…there was this incredible diamond ring flash on the limb of the Sun it was just AMAZING! I was bedazzled by it and that’s when it happened…I looked down at my viewfinder and it was black, I thought I had knocked the camera and could not believe I could not see the Sun. (Oh dear!)
 
I picked up my little Canon G7X camera and took a picture and then another incredible diamond ring flashed and that was it, it was all over…only 58 seconds, but ‘Oh Boy’ it was just awesome, and I didn’t get any pictures of totality except the one with my point and shoot Canon camera!!!
 
I could not believe it, what I’d done in all the excitement was to forget to remove the solar filter off the lens :-o Cheesy was so excited he got the whole of totality through his telescope and Belinda got some awesome pictures as well, everyone was just so excited. Lynn a past member of SAS was also on board and she captured a lovely picture too.
 
I was very conflicted, on one hand I was so upset with myself, but on the other hand I saw and experienced the whole event with my eyes, but I can tell you 58 seconds goes so fast and it was worth every second of it :-)
 
Please see a photomontage of the solar event; I took photos every 10 minutes of the partials right up until the end of the eclipse. I’ve put in my one and only picture of totality that I took with the Canon point and shoot camera. My friends (including Tel) have offered to give me one of there images of totality which was very kind of them, but I’ve gone with my own image to let me know that sometimes things are just the way they are…. are we going overseas for the 2024 eclipse next year, you bet we are!
 
Please see a slideshow of my pictures from our adventure, would we go on board a cruise ship again for an eclipse…Yes, we definitely would, as it’s lots of fun and the atmosphere was just awesome!

~ Solar flare AR3217 ~
 
While observing the Sun early yesterday morning I saw a sudden brightening from sunspot AR 3217 that produced a solar flare.  It didn’t last for very long, but I managed capture it, the previous image taken in monochrome just 5 minutes before do not have that bright activity.
 
There were also quite a few active prominences all around the limb with a small looping prominence not far from AR 3217, the Suns so exciting to observe at the moment as we head toward solar maximum.
 
Images taken with a Lunt (PT) 60mm solar telescope, Canon 700D camera with a 2x Barlow lens attached. Twenty images were capture with an exposure of 1/200th second and ISO200. Images stacked in RegiStax6 and processed in PS. Monochrome images, exposure time was 1/125th second and ISO800 with the same processing.
 
The white light image was taken with a Canon 70D camera and Canon 100-400mm lens with 2x teleconverter making a focal length of 1280mm, a glass solar filter was fitted to lens for safe viewing and imaging.

I only just managed to capture these images of the Sun before the clouds started rolling in showing those two large sunspot areas AR3190 & 3192.

​You can see a lot of activity surrounding them as they both neared the western limb of the Sun; there are also a lot of little sunspots sprinkling right across the northern solar surface.
 
The (Ha) images were taken with a Lunt 60mm solar telescope with a Canon 700D fitted with a 2x Barlow lens, exposure time was 1/320th second and ISO200.

Twenty images captures and stacked in RegiStax6 and processed in PS CS4.
 
The white light image was taken with a Canon 70D camera and Canon 100-400mm lens with 2x teleconverter making a focal length of 1280mm, a glass solar filter was fitted to lens for safe viewing and imaging.