Well, was the glass half full, or was it half empty? At the end of an uncertain session, I decided it was half full – I had at least managed to grab a few images in between downpours, winds that blew my hutch over and almost continuous cloud cover.
The ‘scope covers were on and off as I played hide and seek with the showers, followed a game of by peek-a-boo with the clouds.
The Sun finally cleared the tree line around 7:30am, but rain soon set in so I waited, and waited, in the hope that it would clear. During the very few clear spells, I rattled of perhaps half a dozen avi’s that were generally less than 60 seconds long, due to fast moving clouds from the south. The Pentax was used to grab stills whenever I remembered.
Towards the end, it was agonising seeing Mercury get so close to the limb. I had everything in focus, ready to go, just hoping for a 10 second clear spell but alas, 100% cloud cover prevailed for those crucial few seconds.
At the end of the day, I decided to be content with what I had managed to capture, given the appalling conditions, rather than regret what I had missed.
Nice shots Dennis, glad you were able to see what you did.
Same here, I had great hopes of shooting every angle etc, but with heavy rain for most of the morning, I knew I would be lucky to just "see" it. The rain slowed, and the showers allowed a few fine spells in between, albeit short.
I didn't bother with the computer in and out, as the scope/mount combo was enough.
Given the reports from others (both in NZ and Ozzie) were lucky to get what we did. I actually took the time to just "view" it with an eyepiece, lovely.
Gary
Some quality pics there Dennis that do as much to highlight your patience and persistance as your obvious skill... I didn't think anyone in Brisbane would see anything so well done
Here’s a composite image from a 30 sec avi. I stacked the best 20 Mercury frames and then took that Mercury image and copied/pasted it into a single frame from the same avi that showed a hint of the surface granulation.
During the stacking process, the granulation is unfortunately “lost’ due to the wild seeing conditions, so this was the only method I could think of, to provide a glimpse of the surface granulation.
Hi Dennis,
Great shots.
I took the telescope to work, set it up at 5am outside the hangar and, yep, clouds.
Finally at 6:30 the clouds broke up, and we had on and off viewing for 2 hours.
I had about 40 people stop and have a look.
Erik looked after the tracking, while I experimented with different filters and eyepieces. I was amazed at the difference the filters made to the clarity.
Guess what? I got halfway to work, and realised I had left the camera behind.
I was hoping to get some shots of my own today.
It was a great mornings viewing though. Can't wait for the next Venus transit and the Solar eclipse in 2012.
Here is another composite image to show a spectrum of details that were not available during a single avi process through Registax.
A 90 frame avi from 10:07am was processed in Registax, creating a 20 stack image of Mercury near the limb, approaching 3rd contact. Mercury was used as the alignment reference. The solar granulation was then copied and pasted from a single frame in a separate avi taken at 08:29am, where there was a hint of surface granulation visible. The colour was then added using Corel Photo Paint 12.
Here is another composite image to show a spectrum of details that were not available during a single avi process through Registax.
A 90 frame avi from 10:07am was processed in Registax, creating a 20 stack image of Mercury near the limb, approaching 3rd contact. Mercury was used as the alignment reference. The solar granulation was then copied and pasted from a single frame in a separate avi taken at 08:29am, where there was a hint of surface granulation visible. The colour was then added using Corel Photo Paint 12.
Cheers
Dennis
Mate what a legend you are Dennis. mind you that DMK thingy od mikes looked good to grab images with, I don't even know how to use that toucam I bought from striker yet, I haven't had time to play. Tell you what I am having second thoughts of selling the Pentax now, it came in so handy for my shots, when there is a memory card in it(mike or RB can fill in the details)
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Also, your article didn't mention the UMBRELLA! 
