If anyone has any images they took during the Venus transit of 2004, and doesn't mind me using them in an article for IceInSpace (credit will be given), please post them here or send them to me via email:
I was fortunate that my commanding officer let me set up the Celestron on the edge of the airfield at Holsworthy while we were conducting Blackhawk operations for the day. I tried to talk him into getting a Blackhawk in between the camera and the sun for a shot, but they wouldn't have it.
Will these do or do you want them emailed in higher res? Scanned are not the greatest quality, plus, I didn't have a clue what I was doing at the time really...
At the time I did not have a telescope with solar filter, so I made this projection arrangement out of a pair of binoculars, a tripod and some card.
I should probably warn that this can generate quite a bit of heat in the binos, so I would not do it with anything really valuable or of large aperture, but if you have an old set of small aperture binos, it is a reasonable setup, especially if you want to show a group.
The whole thing worked well, and I got to show my kids who anyhow would have been too young at the time to look through a telescope properly.
At the time I did not have a telescope with solar filter, so I made this projection arrangement out of a pair of binoculars, a tripod and some card.
I should probably warn that this can generate quite a bit of heat in the binos, so I would not do it with anything really valuable or of large aperture, but if you have an old set of small aperture binos, it is a reasonable setup, especially if you want to show a group.
The whole thing worked well, and I got to show my kids who anyhow would have been too young at the time to look through a telescope properly.
In 1882 the surveyor William Condor travelled to Lord Howe Island to observe the transit of Venus. The hill from where he made his observations is now named Transit Hill, and this plaque is mounted at the spot. I took this photo in August this year.
