here's a quick process of one of my shots from this morning. i've got my Vixen GP-DX mount on the beach here at Camp Cooinda and been setting up cameras etc in the evening and letting it all run overnight and then picking up cameras again in the morning to see what i got.
pretty cloudy last night but got this shot through a not very convincing gap in the cloud. contrast against darker sky soon will be good if it can just hang in there..
I can see in Phil's image that the tail past the coalsack is visible, but only just, the naked eye probably won't show this detail though unless the comet moves into a more contrasty sky.
Its been heavily clouded in Brisbane since last 2-3 days so I don't think I will be even able to see it now. Thank god I was in Hervey Bay for Christmas and was able to view this comet with naked eyes.
Thanks for the info Colin and Phil. I'm shooting more and more in RAW now - I just need to get more proficient in processing them! I'll have a look at the software you suggested. It's something I'd certainly like to do more of.
Thank you Liz for including me in that list of great photographers! And i agree, many fantastic images of the comet.
Here's another shot from last night's shoot (and final??). I had a nice Iridium flare (presumably) pass through the middle of the image too! This is a stack of 2 images because the flare path was spread over both - indicating it probably had a long transit time therefore wouldn't have been a comet since the images are 30 sec each with 3 secs in between them for the camera to write them to the disk etc. These were part of a 2 hour series I took for a timelapse but I've also stacked them into a startrail image.
The is at West Beach, Robe, SA. The lights on the landscape is due to the lighthouse almost directly behind me! Although I had misgivings when I turned up to start imaging but I think it adds to the effect.
Thanks Phil. Looks like the comet is running out of puff and the tail is faint above alpha Centauri.
When the comet gets away from the Milky Way it will be easier to measure the tail.
Yeah, I agree with Glen. We're going to have to make as much of whatever clear skies we get from now on because I don't think this comet will last too much longer. Probably a week or so.
I'm excited....this morning was the first time
the head would appear above the house from the FOV of the
QHY-8 setup before twilight started......that is still to process!!!
But here is the 3rd set of 3 from the Pentax DSLR.
3rd set is head above the house (from the other side of the yard)
03:23am to 04:15am local
Hi all - deep-imaged the fainter section of tail this morning (well, after midnight) and can't see much evidence of a tail beyond Beta Centauri, amazing the difference a night makes. That would still have put the tail length at 22-degrees. Here's some gif animations:
Pointers & below, 30-31 Dec, cropped from 55mm shots (3x3min). The tail gets 'cut off' right near the top of the frame as it crosses a small dark patch. Other shots show very little of substance emerging from the other side. http://i727.photobucket.com/albums/w...c11low55mm.gif
I imaged out as far as Eta Carinae neb and couldn't see anything. I didn't wait to see the head or brighter tail rise but the tail was visible naked eye to maybe a bit beyond Alpha Centauri, averted vision on the last bit.
Thanks Phil. Looks like the comet is running out of puff and the tail is faint above alpha Centauri.
When the comet gets away from the Milky Way it will be easier to measure the tail.
Hi Glen - I'm not so sure that's true. I suspect the fade-off has been assisted by the Milky Way although I'd like to hear some expert opinion on it. I've imaged the fainter section of the tail a bit and noticed that whenever it crosses a dark patch in the Milky Way it virtually disappears. Where the Milky Way is very bright it can also wash out the tail but maybe there's a reinforcing thing going on with the tail over the lighter glow. If the tail behaved the same way in dark sky away from the Milky Way as it has been in passing over dark nebulae then maybe the show would have been over days ago. Ah well, time will tell if it can hang on a bit longer!