Our observation

After signing into the Venus Transit 2004 project we decided to do all needed observations and time measurements from the observatory in Rokycany (13,6043°E ; 49,7521°N). The first contact of the Venus with the sun disk was expected at 8:19:47 a.m., so we had to move off the Klatovy about 5 a.m.. Our "team" contained three students and our teacher of physics, who provided the transport, he went 15 minutes later, but in "Trabant" (so the others started to laugh). A jurney took about an hour. We took two reflex scopes (150/750 a 114/900)slony with us, both of them with paralax mounts, one classic reflex camera, one digital reflex camera, one camcoder, one tripod, one radio controlled clock, one copy of Astropis and snack. Both scopes were, of course, equipped with corresponding filters, the bigger one - 150/750 - was equiped with special Baader Astrosolar film, providing a sharp, light violet view(it was clear and sharp even while using the larger zoom - 120x). The second one was covered with a filter, based on mylar foil, so we saw the sun disk in the light yellow spectrum. We made a special adapter which allowed us to photograph using a reflex camera with 52mm lens and ocular of the larger scope. Unfortunately we loaded a cinefilm bad way (B&W Kodak ASA 100), so we became cross refer to the digital technique. We shot a film and took a photographs of projection in the main dome vault (200 mm refractor). Two passages are the result, one takes for almost 40 minutes, the second one takes about 25 minutes, and 58 photos. The digital camera FujiFilm Finepix S5000 supplied a documentary function. Its function was almost documentary, but we took even photos of some projections and some direct photos of the Sun (using the filter from the smaller scope), which are when using the larger zoom quite nice. We weren’t sucessful in recognizing of the first contact of the Venus with the Sun, but we substituted it with scanning the photos and the camcoder record. Before the second contact we took some, carefully wrote down the time, stop and the exposure. It was followed by the second contact, however because of the black drop effect we weren’t able to define the time of second contact, we guess it was 7:37:13. In the next more than five hours we kept the Sun with the Venus "in the scopes", except of this we sat, we solved not only physical problems and even we were interviewed by the "Český rozhlas" (it was broadcasted that day). Our observation was even interpretted as the "professional research". We killed the time with looking for the airplanes and "catching" them into our scopes, wondering about the pinhole camera and discussing the astronomers. Everybody became watchful few minutes before 1 p.m., the third contact was expected at 13:03:42. We defined this time at 13:03:27 while using the scopes. We were able to see the Venus‘ atmosphere with 6,5mm ocular, but it was cockeyed because of the blask drop. We were taking photos and miking notes again and the end was coming, we defined the last time at 13:22:59. It remained only to pack the equipment, to say good-bye and thanks to the crew of observatory and to set out fot the Pilsen.

All times are UT + 2h!!!

Authors: Viktor Kadlec, Kryštof Touška