I took this iffy shot tonight at about 11:00pm, a tad NW and low in the sky of Comet Neowise. Was not expecting to see it until early AM but happened to be out and looked over and unknowingly saw a hazy triangle in the sky. WOW!
Really cool to first get that sense that it is a comet.
It has a VERY long tail, like 5+ moon diameter lengths. Can see it fairly easily with naked eye-not bright, but with binoculars it is spectacular.
Not anywhere near as bright as Hale-Boppe in 1996/97, but impressive. Heck, it is a comet ! Cannot get picky and just relish the amazing event.
Some great meteor action including one that was a very big streak and close\"large"
Not sure I count since I don't own a telescope, but have always been fascinated by this stuff. Had a subscription to Sky and Telescope for years, and was planning on building a sizable Newtonian. Then the first (clear) Hubble images were published, and was so blown away I never bothered to build one.
Really looking forward to the James Webb Space Telescope coming online, but not holding my breath that (1) it will make to a stable orbit at Lagrange point 2 over a million miles from Earth. And (2) that somehow, billions in highly complex, sensitive technology will unfold and actually work. If it does, we're all in for some serious eye-candy and historic scientific surprises.
The European Very Large Telescope currently under construction in Chile could give JWST a run for it's money. This beast will have a segmented primary mirror 130ft in diameter. That's 256 times bigger than Hubble's, and roughly 40 times that of JWST. It will also host the most advanced adaptive optics using 8 artificially produced laser "guide stars" to correct for atmospheric distortions.
Between JWST and the VLT, there's talk of directly imaging planets around nearby stars. Not clearly, but enough to perform spectral analysis of their atmospheres to determine if things like water vapor and organic molecules are present.
Fascinating to say the least. I got a telescope for Christmas one year. I used to sit on my porch and look at the sky at night. Where I was living there wasn't anybody else around. So I had the sky to myself.
I've had telescopes since the early 60's, started young. Before moving from Michigan I ran Longway Planetarium, the largest planetarium in the state. Sold or gave away over a dozen scopes before the move here, they were simply too large to move. At one time I had 17 scopes! It got to be a bit much, the garage was full.
This was just a few minutes ago. Starting around 10:30 pm you can see the comet very faintly with the naked eye. Draw a line from the two stars at the bottom of the Big Dipper's cup towards the northern horizon and look for a fuzzy star. That's it.
I've had telescopes since the early 60's, started young. Before moving from Michigan I ran Longway Planetarium, the largest planetarium in the state. Sold or gave away over a dozen scopes before the move here, they were simply too large to move. At one time I had 17 scopes! It got to be a bit much, the garage was full.
Never had a good telescope, just used terrestrial spotting scopes.
Always wanted a Questar scope ever since I sent for their catalog as a kid in the 70's. I look them up every now and then and I am guessing prices are including some collectible /nostalgia factor.
They just looked cool! I think this is the 3.5? The 7 was the most desirable one.
Never had a good telescope, just used terrestrial spotting scopes.
Always wanted a Questar scope ever since I sent for their catalog as a kid in the 70's. I look them up every now and then and I am guessing prices are including some collectible /nostalgia factor.
They just looked cool! I think this is the 3.5? The 7 was the most desirable one.
We had one of the 3.5" scopes at the Planetarium. I used it a couple of times for astronomical objects and it is just too small to be very useful. But, like you said, they are cool looking.
I shot it in the wee hours Saturday.
Like others, I also turned my lens to jupiter, and was surprised I could detect the moons.
I'll show some extreme zooming in, as my full pictures are no better than those already posted.
I also shot it last night, the tail seemed longer the brightness seemed less, and it was more colored. I don't know if the last aspect is the atmosphere or the comet. Alas, I was not in focus. I'll try again tonight.
shot RAW file format, image processing w DXO PhotoLab.
I shot it in the wee hours Saturday.
Like others, I also turned my lens to jupiter, and was surprised I could detect the moons.
I'll show some extreme zooming in, as my full pictures are no better than those already posted.
I also shot it last night, the tail seemed longer the brightness seemed less, and it was more colored. I don't know if the last aspect is the atmosphere or the comet. Alas, I was not in focus. I'll try again tonight.
shot RAW file format, image processing w DXO PhotoLab.
I saw a shot of our new comet from a guy in France and it was a blend of 15 shots I think. I am guessing the layering brought the final image some incredible fine grain and color. I know this an area of your expertise. Perhaps a blend of underexposed shots increased slowly to lighten?
I know it was a 300mm lens is all. Will dig and see if I can find.
My Moon obsession, trying to get something different than just the Moon in a shot. I know the local bird perches and I keep an eye on the Moon and see if I can get them aligned. Usually not. Lighting is tough.
One of my favorite Moon shots I have taken could have been better it I could have exposed Jupiter different from our Moon-a graduated ND filter would have been the trick.
Top is the shot- Moon and Jupiter, and is powerful enough to show that Jupiter is an orb, not just a spot in the sky (1200mm lens equiv). If I had exposed Jupiter better, it's moons would have popped out, but our Moon would have been washed out.
I am not against burning and dodging some, but multi-exposure work and dropping/pasting drives me batty when I see it.
below-example of a no-win situation with lighting
below: getting closer to balance, or just giving in and loving silhouettes (cop out : )
And lastly, below. Love of extreme super telephoto shots and cropping
Really cool pictures and information here. The kids are loving using our telescope so much that we are upgrading to one that auto aligns itself and is controlled by an app on my phone. It'll be far less boring for them to wait for me to locate everything.
Had my telescope and binoculars out the last few days looking at the Comet. Been putting on quite a nice show. This is the first comet that is visible to the naked eye that I have seen my entire life. Was too young for Hale-Bopp comet.
I used my homemade 6" dobsonian telescope, But I just started working on a 12" one that has been eating my fishing time up.
atleast an hour after sunset on..I find 11:00 pm on best.
Need a pretty dark sky as comet is in the corner of the sky where the Sun went down and over a tad back east (so a true NW view). It is fuzzy and not strong -get binoculars on it and then you should see very well.
Good luck !
Much better view from hood river tonight. Nice and clear vs a blurry spot last night.
Read today the tail is 10 million miles long. Is that right? Crazy....
My country road and it's visitor last night
The comet has changed configuration. It now points nearly straight down versus diagonal the previous nights. Very interesting change I had not anticipated.
Above: last night
Below: night before - comet has really turned downward since this photo !!
Trees at my house block my view below the Big Dipper. Tonight I'll try a better location.
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