FIRST LIGHT

a lack of any granulation detail. In subsequent views with different equipment this remained the case.

For imaging, we attached the eyepiece filter to a 5-inch Astro-Tech TMB-130 refractor and later on a 3-inch Altair Starwave 80ED refractor, using a few different cameras. We were impressed with the detail in the images considering the weather conditions at the time. Attaching a camera is easy – just remove the eyepiece from the Quark and replace it.

Newton’s nuisance

This Quark can be used with both monochrome and colour cameras, with mono devices giving the sharpest detail. The fact that views through the sodium D-line are quite bright helps to keep imaging times down, but can produce a phenomenon known as Newton’s Rings – a series of visible concentric circles. Optional tilt adaptors are available to compensate for this.

On the screen there was a lot more of the granulation detail that was missing when simply looking through the eyepiece, and when roving over the surface of the Sun it was very easy to pick out the smallest of sunspots, which would be hidden to a hydrogen-alpha setup. Daystar says the sodium D-line Quark can pick up flare footprints, but with the lack of solar activity we didn’t see any. The detail around the larger sunspots, however, was very good, and on the videos recorded remained very stable.

It did take a little playing around to get the most from the videos – in the end we found that recording 1,000 frames for each and stacking the 100 top frames gave us the best results – but when we did the D-line Quark gave us more detailed images of sunspots then the calcium and hydrogen-alpha variants. It is a pleasing addition to the Quark family.