Chris (hotspur) graciously hosted Anthony (Grimmeister) and I last night for an evening of beautiful dark skies. Then the clouds moved in just as the comet tail was rising above the horizon - despite SkippySky's forecast for clear skies (not happy, Jan!).
The comet tail has substantially lengthened since my Christmas morning session and now reaches Crux - but it's also much fainter.
I'd been super inspired by all the amazing images here on IIS, but I think I was experiencing a "regression towards the mean" after those epically dark and cloud-free skies in Roma
Here are a few shots between clouds:
1. Using the clouds to my advantage - I really like how thin whispy clouds make the constellation stars stand out like little globes. 2x 30 sec 50 mm f/1.8 ISO 3200 with a Canon 5DmkII mounted on an Astrotrac.
2. Wide field of the comet tail sweeping past Alpha/Beta Centauri all the way up to Crux. The Lamba Centauri and Eta Carina Nebulae are visible near the top-right of frame. I was happy with how well defined the dark dust lanes turned out... got to love dark skies
4x 121 sec 50 mm f/2.0 ISO 800 with a Canon 5DmkII mounted on an Astrotrac.
3. The clouds
finally cleared to give us a full view of the comet after it started becoming washed out by the twilight. 4x 30 sec f/2.0 ISO 1600 with a Canon 20D mounted on an EQ6.
After 18 hours of highway driving and two all-nighters in three days, I think I'm all done! Time to sleep for three days straight
