C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy)

[joshua-babin]

After quite a few nights of cloudy weather, I finally was able to take a shot at viewing Comet Lovejoy tonight. Having never seen a comet through my scope, I was sort of prepared not to see anything (living in Galleria area, light pollution is horrendous). After about 10 minutes though, I found it! Roughly made out a slightly brighter center with surrounding bluish-gray coma. After about a half hour, I could somewhat tell that it had moved a bit in comparison to the nearest star (cannot really see field stars here).

All in all, a successful observation!
Has anyone else popped out to take a peek at it? If so, do we have any photos?

[stephen-jones]

I'm not an astrophotographer, but I've gotten out a few times to look at it visually. I've seen it very easily in my 15x70 binoculars even from the heavy light pollution of my apartment complex. I'm looking forward to tomorrow night out at the dark site so I can see it naked eye, as well as see what it looks like in my telescope.

[steve-fung]

We were probably observing around the same time and similar conditions (inside the Loop close to Galleria). Here is a photo I took using a 90mm f/7 refractor, prime focus, 5x15s ISO1600, stacked centered on the comet nucleus (notice drift of background stars). If the sky remains clear tonight, I will retry with longer exposures to get the tail out, although I'm told the tail is quite weak on this one.

2015.01.15 Comet Lovejoy stacked wb ps crop small.jpg

[edward-fraini]

This evening I picked up the comet in my Garrett 20X80 binoculars from my home north of Tomball. It looked very much like the picture. I would say you did a good job of capturing a natural image. It took me a few minutes to find it by hopping down from M45, like working in the DOB hole visually observing with binoculars at that altitude is tough on the neck.

Again, enjoyed your image.

Ed F.

[steve-fung]

I could not make it to the Dark Site tonight because of work, but I was able to enjoy a bit of the clear night sky from my backyard. Even got a picture of C/2014 Q2 and Pleiades. Not quite like those on S&T, but this is the best I could do inside Houston.

DSC_9719 small.jpg

[steve-fung]

Here's an updated image of Comet Lovejoy C/2014 Q2 next to Pleiades. This is from stacked 10x10s, ISO1600 images using Nikon D800 with 70-200mm f/2.8 lens set to 135mm. The subtle comet tail and nebulosity of the Pleiades is more apparent on this picture. It would be a really nice picture if I can find a way to correct for vignetting and remove the subtle concentric circle artifact in the center background (apparent only on high-contrast monitors). Any comments on how to further clean up this picture would be greatly appreciated.

2015.01.18.1 Comet Lovejoy stacked cp wb ps small.jpg

[rene-gedaly]

That's just what I thought, Ed. Really natural shots, Steve. Even though I had no doubt I'd been tracking the comet each day the weather allowed, the star pattern in your first photo gave me a start, seeing as I did what others were seeing. Kinda like the recognition you feel when you're reading a borrowed book and find a note written in the margin that expresses a similar thought as your own.

[steve-munsey]

We were able to see C/2014 Q2 LoveJoy at the George Bush Park Meet up last night in my Orion EON 80mm Refractor.
Thank you Dana Lambert for locating it
It is currently between the feet of Andromeda (constellation) and headed towards Cassiopeia
I was surprised at how bright it still is.
I hope everyone got a chance to see it.

[steve-fung]

I really wished I could have seen it last night at the G Bush star party. It's like saying one last goodbye to a friend. By your estimate, what magnitude is it?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[steve-munsey]

Maybe a 3.5 to 4.5 I really am not good at judging Brightness.