Observations of Tuesday morning 11/11/2013

Written 12/11/2013 started whilst observing.

Not sure which is more stressful; chasing the comets to image before dawn, processing the most interesting images or thinking of what to write on here :)

Certainly chasing the comets is getting more hectic as drop lower in the sky and it becomes a race to beat dawn.C/2013 R1 Lovejoy is bright and high in the sky, in fact I realised after the fact that I need to look at bringing down the exposure time for Lovejoy.  C/2012 S1 ISON is still high enough to get reasonable images, but 2P/Encke and C/2012 X1 Linear are getting quite difficult.  Today will be the last time I will try - if I have time - for a colour image of Encke and Linear.

All images were captured using the SON@OSC Observatory (Searchlight Observatory Network) 4" Pentax F4 Refractor and an ST8 CCD camera

Here are some of yesterday's images.

The t(r)ail on Encke is still very distinct and some 150 arc minutes of it are visible

2P/Encke

2P/Encke

Linear is getting quite faint, especially now dawn approaches. It is still possible to see the what is left from the recent outburst. 

C/2012 X1 Linear

C/2012 X1 Linear

I expect that this will be the final colour image.

he

C/2012 X1 Linear

The second tail of ISON was first observed a couple of days ago. This was the first chance I have had to image ISON and capture the two tails.

C/2012 S1 ISON

C/2012 S1 ISON

The two tails of Lovejoy are quite clear. There seems to be, below the other two tails, either a third tail starting or a minor outburst. 

  

C/2013 R1 Lovejoy

C/2013 R1 Lovejoy

I will start the observing report of this morning's observations soon. The tails of ISON have changed so I will want to get an image on here soon. :)