Kevin Smith’s observatory

Woodford Halse, Northamptonshire

In my rather small garden I have a Sirius Home Dome observatory, in which I have recently commissioned my new Paramount ME mount. My especial interest is solar observation, and I have set up a facility for imaging the Sun using a DayStar 0.5-Å H-alpha filter on an FS128, a DayStar 5-Å calcium K-line filter on a Vixen 80-mm f/11.4 refractor with a 2.5x Powermate, and an FCT76 with a 2-inch Herschel wedge for white-light whole-disc work. In addition, I use a Basler digital camera with Aquinto A4I Docu software, which produces a live image on the PC screen, and captures at 1,300 x 1,030 pixels. This equipment is set up to be used both visually and for imaging remotely from the house. My intention is to image the Sun in the continuous spectrum and at various wavelengths of monochromatic light, to highlight and record short-term events, and to watch for long-term developments. I have now extended my work to deep-sky imaging, using LRGB.

E-mail : kevsmith@globalnet.co.uk. . . . . . . . Web sites : www.kevsmith.com . www.siriusobservatoriesuk.com