Hi all
With perfectly clear and quite dark (for Newcastle) skies I decided to go close and deep, got out the 300mm f2.8 flourite lens from Bert, used his idia of external aperature stop, about f3.5, modded 350D, UV/IR filter, 8x5 mins ISO200. Taken today, 2nd January. Big gradients to smooth out with Iris and even had to use Gradient Xterminator to get rid of the last bits of gradient. Even then there might be some small blemishes there
Gee the lens works well. Even wide open theres only a little flaring of bright stars but slightly stopped down, its fantastic.
Full sized version
here
Note there is no central condensation around the nucleus, its just all diffuse, I wonder why?
The comet is so faint theres no chance of seeing it naked eye from here, I had to take short high ISO pics to locate and frame the comet. Even then it is barely visible and I had to stretch the subs to be able to see it at all. It now has very low surface brightness.
Scott