Mercury Transit at St. Martin's Day

[Filipe Carneiro]

Saint Martin's Day offered us a glimpse of light to photograph the solar mercury transit.
Double exposure photography. The black spot near the center of the sun is mercury. The sun looks blue due to the use of a Mylar filter.

 

[rod]

Saint Martin's Day offered us a glimpse of light to photograph the solar mercury transit.
Double exposure photography. The black spot near the center of the sun is mercury. The sun looks blue due to the use of a Mylar filter.

Filipe, great photo here! I enjoyed viewing the entire Mercury transit using my 90-mm refractor with glass white light solar filter (no images - altitude/azimuth controls and tripod). I viewed at 40x and 71x. Mercury near mid-transit (10:19 AM EST or so for me), incredible sight! I pondered the size difference in view, Mercury, the Sun, and their different distances. Mercury near 10" angular size, the Sun near 1938" angular size so nearly 194x larger in the eyepiece!

 

[Filipe Carneiro]

Filipe, great photo here! I enjoyed viewing the entire Mercury transit using my 90-mm refractor with glass white light solar filter (no images - altitude/azimuth controls and tripod). I viewed at 40x and 71x. Mercury near mid-transit (10:19 AM EST or so for me), incredible sight! I pondered the size difference in view, Mercury, the Sun, and their different distances. Mercury near 10" angular size, the Sun near 1938" angular size so nearly 194x larger in the eyepiece!
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[Filipe Carneiro]

Thank’s Rod.
I have enjoyed your disctription.

 

[rod]

FYI Filipe et al. I went back and reviewed some calculations for the Mercury transit I entered into my stargazing log. Mercury was near 0.676 a.u. from Earth, the Sun about 0.99 a.u. (Earth approaching perihelion distance). At Mercury's distance, the Earth would exhibit a 26" angular size - still dwarfed by the view of the Sun, just like some sunspots I viewed and tracked this year, some 2x or so the size of Earth (sunspot AR2738 back in April for example), yet there was that enormous view of the Sun . I used Starry Night, Stellarium, and Sky & Telescope to check ephemerides for the event. Mercury moved across the Sun's disk retrograde, east to west while the Sun rotates west to east (Bob King at Sky & Telescope reported and diagramed). Viewing the Mercury transit, was a great way to see the heliocentric solar system in action using my modest equipment from a large farm field near where I live.

 

[Brad Watson - Miami]

Saint Martin's Day offered us a glimpse of light to photograph the solar mercury transit.
Double exposure photography. The black spot near the center of the sun is mercury. The sun looks blue due to the use of a Mylar filter.

"St. Martin's Day"?! Sounds religious - not that I have any problem with that. When religion & science converge, then they should be discussed that way. To the ancients, there was no separation of religion and science.

 

[Mental Avenger]

Saint Martin's Day offered us a glimpse of light to photograph the solar mercury transit.
Double exposure photography. The black spot near the center of the sun is mercury. The sun looks blue due to the use of a Mylar filter.

I missed that. I was busy doing other things, mainly getting my antennas finished before the snow. I appreciate your providing such a great photo. Good job.