Image of sunspot group

Seanie,
The group reminds me of the coathanger in Vulpecula !
A while back i tried using a film SLR camera to do exactly what your trying there, for me the the biggest problem was that the camera just couldnt focus on something that near, so I had to move back to focus, but then it was too small.

You're right Dave, it does look like The Coathanger!

I know what you mean on the whole focus thing, but in my case, I think those high altitude cirrus clouds had a bit to do with it. At times, there were stationary waves across the suns disk, making it look like I had wobbly glass in y telescope! But these soon changed. But the camera wasn't great either.

Seanie.

Nice shot Conor! What did you use to take it? You have one of them solar filter thingies too?

Seanie.

Michael,

Nice image of the sunspot. I was supprised to see the change in the shape in just 24 hours!

I also took a webcam image of sunspot (on Kerry AC's site) but it is nothing as good as Dave's above, I never get granulation like that :shock:

Michael O'C. Have you tried a faster exposure, I see that you used 1/60 sec and stacked? With the turbulence that low in the sky I found that the shorter the exposure the better.

Michael S. KAC/SAC

PS If you invert the image it looks like a grumpy Smiley or Emoticon.

Michael S.
On this attempt I used ISO100 as the object is very bright. 1/60sec isn't the fastest exposure but it's still a heck of a lot shorter than what a webcam will catch (60fps vs. 5fps). I found that on previous occassions I used higher values of ISO and had much faster exposures as a result. However, the end image wasn't any different (the image didn't get any sharper). I'm thinking that mabey the 300d has a limit in capturing high contrast detail on the sun? Is this a possibility? I have captured several images whilst minutely changing the focus on the scope. However, the detail never seemed as sharp as I could see in the eyepiece.
What do you think?
To capture detail in sunspots with the 300d, do we need to use a 2" 2x barlow or some other lens to increase the telescope focal length?

Nice shot Conor! What did you use to take it? You have one of them solar filter thingies too?

Seanie.

Yep! I've an Orion (thanks Eugene) Glass Solar Filter

Michael S,
That group has really changed, it must be very active!!

Michael OC,
Using shorter exposures can increase the detail, but then again it depends on the seeing etc, if the seeing is good the resulting differance might not be noticable.
For the Sun, I've found that I never get images as sharp as I get with the the moon, day time seeing is inherently bad as the atmosphere is been heated by the Sun.
I cant think of a way why the canon cant get detail from the sun, except maybe the pixel resolution (pixels per arcsecond) is not a good match for your scope, but you would have come across this with other objects, so that probabily isn't it.

I've played around with using extension tubes and focal reducer position to change the focal length of the scope (SCT), I have 2 pics which are going on the SAC site soon which demonstrate this.