Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Comet Imaging Session - July 22, 2020 Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE

I wasn't expecting the sky to clear up this evening as it was cloudy and hazy whole afternoon. But as I was going home, I saw some open sky in the NW so I started to setup my imaging equipment which consist of Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera on Canon EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 IS L lens set at 400mm f/5.6 on Vixen GPDX mount. The comet at around 7:15pm was about only 20 deg high thus I didn't opt to image using ASI294 MC Pro until the comet is situated higher than 30 deg. As I was about to image the comet, light clouds rolled in and it was a cat and mouse game and I was able to get a few fair images through plants and fence openings to image the comet for the first time in the evening sky so I'm not complaining. I also had a great time imaging and observing the comet with a pair of 10x50 binoculars with my son as well. Comet estimated magnitude is about magnitude 4.0 and was a bit hard also to view through binoculars due to the haze. I can also make out about 1 degree shirt tail through the haze. I got to see the comet through some holes in the NW sky at around 7:35pm and was bale to get 30secs worth of exposure before it got obstructed by the building as well as more plants!!! I hope to image it again tomorrow at an earlier time so I can get away from the fence and plants.

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