Finally after a very long spell of smoky and/or cloudy skies today was a good imaging day.
(All images taken with a DMK-41 camera unless otherwise noted.)
Bill

A fat filament that covers a lot of surface area. -

AR2418 (DMK-21) Inverted -

AR2418 Wider view Inverted -

AR2415 & AR2418 The larger very white area next to AR2415 may be some flare activity. -

AR2415 inverted -

The only proms that I imaged.  There weren't any spectacular proms today that I saw. -

Mono inverted view of AR2415 with AR2418 in upper left corner. -

More filaments. -

A look at AR2418 using the 2.5 Powermate. -

Proms using the DMK-21 & 2.5 Powermate. -

Sept 16 & 17 Solar Images

I have enjoyed 4  days of clear sky's with pretty good conditions but the party is over now , the clouds have moved in and rain is in the forecast . The best part of the show was the big prom and AR 2418

Mike

                                                                    Sept 16 2015

Sept 17 2015

Sun Continues !

This has been a fantastic week for solar imaging for me . Today will be the 4th day in a row of cloudless sky's . There are a couple of active AR's and  huge prom up there right now . These images are from Sept 15 . I also have captures from yesterday to finish up and I will be shooting again today . I have been overwhelmed with processing this week and have been trying to catch up but the sun keeps shining so I am compelled to keep imaging .

Mike

                                                                Sept 15 2015

Solar images from Sept 14 2015

A good report from Bill on the current state of the sun , things seem to be picking up a bit as far as sun spots , AR  2418 is a beauty !
    I have had a couple of fairly decent imaging days , these were done later in the day yesterday and things were starting to boil by the time I was shooting . I was out again today but much earlier and the conditions were better so I am hoping for some sharper detail in the next batch .
Mike

Solar activity is very low at the moment.  I'm posting a copy of the American Radio Relay league  (ARRL) solar report from their September 10, 2015 news letter.

The K7RA Solar Update

Tad Cook, K7RA, in Seattle, reports: The Australian Space Forecast Centre issued a Geomagnetic Disturbance Warning at 0132 UTC on September 8: "The effect of a high-speed solar wind stream from a coronal hole is keeping geomagnetic activity enhanced."
The NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) Daily Geomagnetic Data show the resulting high numbers indicating geomagnetic instability. On HF we might see higher absorption rates, but on VHF, we might see some interesting propagation modes.
Note that there are no mid-latitude or high-latitude A index numbers for September 8, 9, and 10. This is probably because geomagnetic activity was strong enough to knock the respective magnetometers out of service.
Frank Donovan, W3LPL, shared a link to the American Astronomical Society Nova article, "Witnessing Solar Rejuvenation," which proposes that Cycle 25 may be similar to Cycle 24.
Weak solar activity continues. The average daily sunspot number for September 3-9 was only 37.3, down 11 points from the previous 7 days. Average daily solar flux was 85.3, compared to 97 for the previous week.
Geomagnetic activity was strong, with the average planetary A index up from 19.4 to 27.1. The most active day was September 9, when the planetary A index was 59.
The latest solar flux prediction from USAF/NOAA has readings of 85, 90, and 100 on September 10-12; 105 on September 13-14; 110 on September 15-17; 115 on September 18-22; 110, 105, 100, and 95 on September 23-26; 90 on September 27-October 1, and 85 on October 2-7. Flux values then rise to 115 for October 15-19.
Predicted planetary A index is 28, 16, and 27 on September 10-12; 16, 10, and 8 on September 13-15; 5 on September 16-17; then 8, 20, and 10 on September 18-20; 5 on September 21-23; 15 and 10 on September 24-25; 5 on September 26-29; 8 and 18 on September 30-October 1; 12 on October 2-4; 8 on October 5; 5 on October 6-7; 8, 12, and 8 on October 8-10, and 10 on October 11-13.
Sunspot numbers for September 3 through 9 were 27, 36, 24, 38, 47, 40, and 49, with a mean of 37.3. The 10.7 cm flux was 86.5, 89.9, 85.4, 85.6, 83.7, 83.5, and 82.3, with a mean of 85.3. Estimated planetary A indices were 9, 20, 13, 14, 46, 29, and 59, with a mean of 27.1. Estimated mid-latitude A indices were 9, 18, 10, 12, 27, 24, and 31, with a mean of 18.7 (the September 8 and 9 numbers are my own estimates).

The sunspot number is a computed number using a formula that includes sunspots, sunspot groups.  The sunspot number in this report is 37.3.  For an approximation of the number of sunspots divide the sunspot number by 15.   In this case 2.48.  A pretty low number.

Sunspot Number Computation - 

Bill

Sun from September 7 2015

Another clear but hazy day here , our weather in Ontario has been hot and very humid lately . Good news from Bill though , his valley is finally starting to clear of the smoke that has been preventing him from being able to do any imaging . We are all hoping for some more activity , hopefully there is something ready to come around the limb soon . There were lots of filaments but not much sun spot action , so here is what things looked like on Sept 7 .

Mike

AR 2411 was the only visible AR that I could find , the haze limited the magnification to 1.6X

Solar images from Sept 1 2015

I finally had a reasonably clear day for some imaging . There were no clouds but the air was very humid and the sky was hazy . The native focal length images turned out not too bad but the barlowed shots lack the fine detail that I like to see .
  Bill has been smoked out for most of this summer due to wild fires in his area . The last one came very close to his property and I was very pleased to hear that it was controlled before it reached him .
 I miss seeing his images but know that he will be back posting as soon as things clear up down in Idaho . I am counting on him to fill any voids this winter when I am up to my neck with snow !!
 Anyway here is yesterdays sun , a day late as usual for me !
Mike
Note from Bill -
Great images from Mike as usual!  I just hope that we are up to our necks in snow this winter too.  With the drought in the western US it isn't likely though.  I hope to be able to image real soon.  The smoke is slowly clearing.  There are around 300 square miles of range land smoldering out there.