I can't help but be amazed at the number of separate threads about Comet Lovejoy!
It must be a record!
I don't remember Comet McNaught being this popular even though it was larger and an early night-time comet.!!
Here is a screen shot of just the first 2 pages of the IIS Forum Threads list and they keep going on pages 3 and 4 etc.
I have noticed that it has been this way for the last week at least, and it's gaining in popularity!
Ken my eastern horizon is poor, but can I have some approximate times for best sighting/snapping? I might try to take some tripod shots and stack them.
Regards,
Stephen
Stephen, it looks like it will be in a good high altitude position for most of us in the southern half of Australia from about 3:30 onwards.
I have a clear view of the horizon from the spot I am going to image from so I will start snapping away about 2:30 am.
According to CDC, at my location (I'm on the 37th parallel) the head of Comet Lovejoy rises at 1:45am.
The tail should be obvious well before then.
Last edited by ballaratdragons; 27-12-2011 at 11:47 PM.
Stephen, try and be ready to shoot for between 2:30-3:30am. You can go later to 4:00 at a pinch but that twilight will really start to play havoc with the viewing pretty quickly. A few days ago, not so bad, as the comet was nearer the Sun and brighter. But it's starting to fade a bit now, so the darker the sky, the better.
It's a battler.
Everyone loves a battler.
It shouldn't really have been here.
Survived a fatal encounter with the sun and gave us a good show at Crimbo.
Hard to fault something like that.
ClouuuuuuuuuuuuD Disapeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar from Wamboin NSW
Repeat as necessary until desired result achieved
If ineffective please see you psychologist.
But seriously Ric,
I know how you feel I thought I was going to miss it we got 1 clear day and one partial clear day and going by the weather now we were very lucky. I really hope it clears for you before it is to late.
Maybe it's to do with the availability of high quality cameras at affordable prices? Many of the current images are pushing SLRs to their limits on fixed tripods (30 sec, high ISO, wide apertures)... would have been a lot more difficult with a compact camera back then.
I think that it is a combination of things. The crappy weather stopping other observing and a bright object that doesn't require tens of thousands of dollars of equipment to take a good image.
All good except for the hour of the day. I still can't bring myself to get up before dawn with cloud around so haven't seen it.
Not the only one Ric. Yesterday at 2.00am was 100% cloud and this morning it was raining. Yet it was perfectly clear at 8.00am. The prediction for the next few days is for basically clear weather except between about 1am and 7am.
yes H
onya, Terry!
.
