did anyone else go to their local planetarium / observatory for the transit of venus? if you missed it, the next transit will occur in 2117, so maybe your grandchildren might get a chance to see it. it was an unusally perfect combination of circumstances for viewing in chicago. one of the telescopes was set up with a hydrogen-alpha filter that allowed us to see, in addition to venus, solar flares arcing off the sun's edges -- gave me goosebumps.

here's a really terrible photo i took with my shaky hands + camera + disposable eclipse shades:



if you squint, you can just barely make out a slightly darker spot at the 1 o'clock position, about 1/4" in from the edge. the black spot was clearly defined if observed through a telescope or even with your own eye + eclipse shades. the whole experience was surprisingly amazing in the truest sense. seeing so many people flocking to the planetarium made me happy, too.

Two celestial events that I've missed recently - first the solar eclipse that occurred a few weeks back, and then this yesterday. Stupid clouds.

Cloud cover put a damper on things here too unfortunately. I was quite excited to see this. Oh well, guess I'll just wait for the next 105 years I am surprised how nice your shot came out actually, well done Bill. The wiki page has some nice assortment of images too from different places around the world, for any others who couldn't see if for themselves.

Here's some time lapse footage of the transit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... Z9rM8ChTjY

I wanted to see this so bad. We had mostly sun and some clouds yesterday in Buffalo. Being the geek I am I should have prepared for it. I tried looking through Wayfarers to see it and was immediately blinded by the sun. Oh well.....at least I saw all the planets aligned in the night sky as a kid in 82, Halley's comet (albeit barely in 86) etc....

wow.

Wow indeed. Puts a lot of things in perspective.

hey, i can see my house from here!

but in all seriousness, the astronomy nerd in me is highly impressed with all this coverage...
and is also kicking me in the head for not remembering to check it out firsthand.