Here are a couple images of the huge sunspot group beginning to cross the sun’s face. I took these this morning around 08:45 EDT. The large complex is active region (AR) 10808, the very small spot to its upper right is AR 10809. In both pictures north is at the top.
I took the images afocally, using my Nikon Coolpix 800 digital camera, through my 8-inch f/8 Newtonian reflector with a 7-inch aperture Baader solar filter. They were taken with the camera mounted to a 14mm Tele Vue Radian eyepiece, and then digitally processed using Paint Shop Pro.
Doug
Postscript: Activity on the sun had been very high over a period of several days: in addition to sunspots, several X-class solar flares and several coronal mass ejections (CMEs) had been observed. The source of all this activity was the sunspot group seen in the photo above.
CMEs can trigger an aurora (sometimes called “northern lights”) and that evening there was an aurora (see photographs of that aurora).
WARNING: Viewing the sun without proper protective devices can result in permanent eye damage.