The top of G-deck turned out to be a good decision. There were a few other people there, but nothing like the crowds in Woodruff park (where I understand fights broke out over viewing equipment.)
I used a regular photographic tripod, which is decidedly sup-optimal for astronomy, but good enough for this purpose.
You can see how the shadow appears to roll over the sun in the sequence below.
I ordered a solar filter for my long lense. It looks something like a very fragile and expensive piece of tinfoil, but works.
Even with that filter, getting the exposure correct can be a bugger. I ended up in manual mode 1/4000 s f29 iso2000. The featured image shows the results, and, yes, those dots in the middle of the sun are sunspots. So we’re ready to go. I’ll probably play around a bit with the film speed to reduce noise, but this is decent enough to work. I’ll use a tripod tomorrow and be at the top of G-deck.
If you don’t adjust the exposure, the sun is completely washed out. Not at all what you want.
A flock walked by recently. Not quite as cuddly as cats, but neat nonetheless.
(sorry about the repost, but wordpress would not let me fix the image. ****** ***** **** ****).
This weekend is the second Hackathon at GSU. Since I’m the faculty advisor, you can guess what I’ll be doing.
A hackathon is a student-led, national and international contest, that pits teams of students against each other in a race to develop a computer application in limited time. They work with industrial sponsors to address real-world problems with state of the art technologies.
I’m especially proud of our team. They are led by an adjunct professor Dr EE Durham – who just happens to have been my student (about all the credit I can claim) and have put together a well-organized event. This is the second one they’ve done. The first rocked, and this is likely to be even better.
It shows GSU can do a great job when they’re given the chance!
R. Harrison, Creative Enterprises 