Astronomy and skies

[HDQQ]

I saw it on a couple of nights. I read that it could be seen with the naked eye and I spotted what looked like a faint star that looked a bit smudged. I got the binoculars and sure enough, it was the comet.

[Barry]

It's now a very faint smudge in binoculars, I wouldn't call it a naked eye comet any more.
We have perfectly clear skies tonight.

[johnofgwent]

That's what I meant about working in the dark. You hope the camera is set on infinity for focus and try to reduce the aperture a bit and up the time to get a little leeway on the depth of field. And my eyes are probably better than your battle worn orbs!
Anyway, those 4 images are great efforts. I looked at it last night and thought that it is losing some brightness as it moves away from the sun. It is closest to Earth in the next few days, but I think it is probably past its best.

The mark of a "professional" is the ability to field strip an instrument in pitch black. A skill not limited to royal marines with assault rifles. 

What really caught my attention shockingly was how dark it WASN'T - I could not see a thing but the wide shot at 70mm clearly shows my neighbour's roof tops and my (steel) garden shed

The light source illuminating my shed is an LED PIR floodlight fitted to a house FOUR HUNDRED YARDS AWAY - they take their dog out for a late night walk and they trigger their PIR light when they do ...



As to the comet's visibility, I agree, I have seen the same said on a couple of photography groups. Closer does not mean brighter it seems.

[Barry]

That's what I meant about working in the dark. You hope the camera is set on infinity for focus and try to reduce the aperture a bit and up the time to get a little leeway on the depth of field. And my eyes are probably better than your battle worn orbs!
Anyway, those 4 images are great efforts. I looked at it last night and thought that it is losing some brightness as it moves away from the sun. It is closest to Earth in the next few days, but I think it is probably past its best.

[papasmurf]

Picture from local newspaper website:-

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/spectacular-photos-show-comet-neowise-4351066

[johnofgwent]

These are four shots from a series taken in my back garden.

To the intense annoyance of my daughter these were taken in stygian blackness in my back garden so I had to do it my touch - proving she's not the only one who can (!!)

For the techno nerds. The camera is a Canon 450D set to Aperture Priority Average Metering ISO 1600 Auto White Balance

The lens a Tamron 70-200mm telephoto, set to MANUAL focus and the widest aperture I could muster, which varied between f4 and f5.6

The exposure times ere between 6 and 8 seconds

It was really bizarre taking these. I could not squint down the eyepiece to see what i was doing, because the street lights on the road across the river got in my eyes and messed with my through the lens vision.

So I had to do this real old school, take the shot, wait and see what came back on the preview screen. It was almost like going back to the days of click the shutter, and pray what domes out in the darkroom is what you wanted.

It was only when I was looking through the EXIF data on each image I realised I took these around midnight on the 20th of July. A fitting throwback to another 20th July spent stargazing.

[Barry]

Well done, John.

[johnofgwent]

YES !!!!! GOT the f****r

Unfortunately Virgin proved they earned the name by not going all the way YET AGAIN five minutes after i powered off the camera last night.

ETA to fix 1500 Zulu 21.07

We shall see. 4G Vodafone is shite too as every f***r with their unlimited package is using their phone as a hotspot ...

[Barry]

Beautiful clear skies at the moment. Comet is "just" naked eye in the dusk, but in binoculars is great.

[johnofgwent]

Frankly, that's pretty good.

The pictures "professionals" put up on facebook have been seriously reprogrammed to remove noise and sharpen the image. They are often a mix of multiple images - nine to sixteen are not uncommon in what i have seen written up

My daughter knows how to do it, because she learned as part of her degree.

I took a photo of "Old Harry Rocks" a tourist landmark east of Swanage a year or two back, gave her the RAW image off my camera card and it looks awfully washed out - she reprocessed it so the colours were so REAL in the algae discolouring the rock and when we had it blown up to an A3 and framed, man you can smell the seaweed.

[Barry]

This was my best effort on 10th July:

My constraints were: Weak, cheap tripod on garden table. Wife's camera, I'm not really good with in the dark. Too dark for auto focus. My eyes need correction so can't manually focus without glasses on.
No idiots around pointing their headlamps at me, thank goodness, Might have lost my rag!

[johnofgwent]

For those who want to look for it....

Find the plough / big dipper / whatever you call it.  Think of it as a stylised frying pan.

Now instead of the two stars at the edge of the pan opposite the pan handle that point to Polaris, you are interested in the two stars that form the bottom of the frying pan...

Looklaong the line made by those two stars in the direction AWAY from the pan handle.

Neowise will be at about 15 degrees elevation (above the horizon)

This is why I went to the highest part of the heads of the valley's road to view it.  No obstructions on the horizon for miles around...

I found the "stellarium" mobile app on google play quite decent for helping me find the comet but remember it's time code is set to zulu time (GMT) NOT bST

[johnofgwent]

Anyone else seen Comet Neowise? It's quite bright in the NW sky after sunset.
I got a pic a while back, not that good, but since been dogged by cloudy skies.

Yes.

To get an appreciation of how hard it is to get a decent image of the thing, read this (if you can)

This is NOT my photo. I barely know the guy, but it shows what CAN be done - and details how many hoops you must jump through to get it

https://www.facebook.com/MathewBrownePhotography/photos/a.542599589236284/1634033060092926

Matthew cross posted to a facebook group dedicated to photography in south wales which is where i saw the image.

I made the following comment, which will explain to you why I have no image of the thing (yet)

"Last night at 11:30 I was standing in the car park / viewpoint that has been built at the highest point of the A465. I had a really decent view of the comet. However, as I set up my tripod some prize (am I allowed to swear on here ? If so I will come back and put what I really want to say in this bracket) on a side road, or maybe in the field, about 800 yards away on the other side of the A465 drove some vehicle until he was DIRECTLY between me and the comet, pointed his bonnet right at me and hit his main beams.

And kept them on for 30 minutes. Ruining ANY chance I had of getting a shot.

He may have kept them on longer. I gave up by midnight.

Now, in my prior career I designed radar and radar guided missiles. I still have some numbers on speed dial. I'm thinking of going back tonight and taking a trailer....."

There are a very, very few individuals of whom I can say I would actually enjoy watching my explosive handiwork rearrange their rectum. The bastard who quite deliberately acted to f**k my chances of photographing the comet (i could see his f**king grin through my telephoto lens) is on a very, very select list. So select that unlike a certain poster from cornwall's similar list there are no politicians on it .

[Barry]

Anyone else seen Comet Neowise? It's quite bright in the NW sky after sunset.
I got a pic a while back, not that good, but since been dogged by cloudy skies.