SUN Timelapse Raw 14 March

[sungrazer]

Hi everyone

https://vimeo.com/89763010

Here is a raw timelapse of the sun with a large prom taken through a pst with a DMK21 (its mono) piggybacked on a meade lx200 10'. 30fps and only 1 shot every 30 seconds. So its about 4-5 hours worth i think. Next time will shoot 1 every 15 seconds.

It's the first time I've piggy backed the pst onto this mount. (Which is also now on a pier and a wedge). I think the polar alignment is good but this timelapse suggests its not not tracking over a long period well. I think the problem might be with the meade custom tracking setting not being sensitive enough. I believe you need 3.5 not 3 for solar work. it seems to be bouncing around a little bit more than i like as well. It may need pec training or some backlash compensation.


Anyway, take a look below the large prominence toward the end of the video - its much more interesting.


Comments suggestions observations welcome. Given this is my first attempt at solar timelapse, I would especially love to hear from anyone who has ideas on:

a) how to make the raw frames better in terms of clarity and of course colour. (I dont want to stack this just yet - just get the timelapse going. I would like to make this better to view.

b) how to compensate for the meade lx200 custom setting. ANY ideas ANYONE?

Thanks for viewing

Karen

[Star Catcher]

Hi Karen
Whilst I am quite experienced in Solar imaging, animations are not strength and there are others on this forum who are better placed to comment. Here are my observations and thoughts.

You want to capture visible change, so the best way to do this is to lengthen the time between exposures, not lessen them to 15 seconds. If you make more frames, then yes it is smoother, but it will be like watching grass grow. You will have doubled the number of frames and to better see change you may have to speed it to 60 fps instead of 30fps.

So I suggest 2-3 minutes between images. Let's say 2 mins that gives 90 frames over 3 hours. You then run that at about 10 fps. Yes it will be a 9 second slower motion clip, but the change will be more obvious.

In you want to add colour, each frame will need to have applied a colour gamut. Easily done in photoshop by making the frame RGB and playing with colour balance. If you are not stacking frames, then better clarity can only come from good seeing conditions when taking video and being critical about very good focus.

In regards to the mount, an expectation of 3 hours tracking without any adjustment is a lot to ask. There is either a wrong tracking rate or you are not polar aligned. You can manage the problem by baby sitting the scope. You can place some stick-on markers on your screen at obvious features and make sure you correct the drift before too much movement occurs across the movies. There are solar trackers available but expensive, see here: http://telescopes.net/store/hutech-hinode-solar-guider.html
I believe some forum members have also been developing a unit.

I don't know anything about the Meade tracking rates so I'll leave that to others.

I also suggest you might want to join the more specialised Solarchat forum here: http://solarchat.natca.net/index.php

Ted

[h0ughy]

Ted is on the money - see solarchat for extra help. in saying that some of the members here put me onto the straight and steady.

what i do:

stack the lot in autostakkert 2 - highlight and process all your runs - (i choose the best 60 frames out of 600) and save as tiffs
then take all of the images and put them into photoshop - scripts - load files into stack and select the tick box to align.
when it finally finishes the churning of the photons - you will have them all lined up - now since your image has moved heaps over the time i think it best to crop around the main prom.
after you do that you then need to do this next - well i do anyway and that is to export layers to files (same area as the load files to layers.

by saving the individual layers you can then run batch files for colouring and sharpening etc on them . then you can use Microsoft movie maker or some other programme and then select all and then change the time to 0.1sec between frames - the rest is up to you but i have done that on the images i have done. it is a heap of processing but worth it.


i am looking to getting an autoguider at some stage just for timelapse

[sungrazer]

Hi Guys

This is really helpful info thanks so much
the sun is so quiet at the moment - i was pleased just to get a decent sized prom to have a first run with
I'll try the procedure and see how i go

cheers
Karen