From: "doobisary" <tjp314@pacbell.net>

Date: June 24, 2012 9:39:16 AM MDT

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: the deep blue sea

Amazing, Alan!!

So, did Pt Grey offer a discount at NEAF like I heard they might?  I was poking around the net yesterday to see who else is using these new exview HAD chips, and found that Starlight Xpress is (not surprisingly, since they've favored Sony chips since their inception).  What is surprising is that their price for their cooled version with the 6mp chip is $1K less than Pt Grey's uncooled version.  Of course, the Grasshopper has a much higher frame rate (the SX takes 5 seconds to download a full frame).  But if cooled Deep sky is the objective, the slow downloads might not be an issue.

...but I'd really like one of the new Grasshoppers!

-Tim.

--- In Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com, Alan Friedman <alan@...> wrote:

Hi all,

I arrived at Mount Wilson the day before the transit of Venus. I had enough time to get everything unpacked and set up for a test run and shot two streams of video to make sure the computer and cameras were all happy and talking to each other. I forgot about these files in the excitement of June 5th. Looking back through the files while archiving the 200 gigabytes of data from my trip, the conditions on June 4th were much better than the following day… in fact, it is some of the best solar seeing I've experienced in some time. Apologies in advance for the large images, but I couldn't bear to reduce them:

http://www.avertedimagination.com/img_pages/deepbluesea.html

and for those who prefer a non-inverted look at the solar chromosphere:

http://www.avertedimagination.com/img_pages/deepbluesea2.html

These images are not mosaics. They show the full size field of view of the Grasshopper Express 6 megapixel chip used with the f 4.8 Stowaway and Televue 2X powermate. 

Hope you enjoy them!

Alan

Alan Friedman

avertedimagination.com