Adventures in Astrophotography

Comet 17P/Holmes continues to put on a show for skywatchers willing to brave the cold weather. After an incredible run of clear skies through much of the fall, skies turned snowy here in Park City. Storms have been passing over or very near the area for much of the last week or so. This wasn’t too bad as it coincided with the large phases of the moon. Now that the moon has vacated the scene, its nice that skies have taken a break. I was wondering what Comet Holmes would look like after this extended absence. I was also wondering where it’d moved to. Well, first of all, its still very near Mirfak (alpha Perseus). Now, a couple of degrees to the southwest of the bright star. Quite easy to find once my eyes were dark adapted. The comet isn’t quite as bright as it was a couple of weeks ago but it continues to grow. It’s almost filling the eyepiece, perhaps 3/4* in diameter?
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Comet 17P/Holmes burst onto the astronomy scene just three weeks ago. In that time, its captured the attention of astronomers worldwide. Brightening one million fold literally overnight the comet has grown steadily as well. From its earliest days, Comet Holmes has proved to be far more interesting than almost anyone would have imagined.

Here are a couple of interesting pictures taken last night. Both of these were taken using my Canon Rebel XTi. The first was what I went out to capture, Comet 17P/Holmes passing by the bright star Mirfak (α Per). As you can see the star appears within the growing expanse of the comet. Set against a background of stars in the constellation Perseus the comet continues on its merry way.
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got out an snagged some sweet views of Comet 17P/Holmes again this evening. I viewed through both the Astro Physics Starfire 160 (6.2″) and the ObDob, a 25″ Obsession Dobsonian Reflector. Views were sweet in both, but I have to say… at least as far as telescopes go… size does matter
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got out under some pretty sweet skies and checked out Comet 17P/Holmes again. It is an amazing object. It has grown immense over the last few days. Reports indicate that it is now roughly 1/2 the visual diameter of the moon! This is colossal. I could even see that the comet no longer looks star-like to the naked eye. It has grown fat Pointing the scope at it, revealed a bunch of new details. First up were the background stars visible through the haze of the comet. These gave a nice sense of place to the comet. It is out there, cruising through our solar system. I didn’t get to pull the big scope out as I was hoping to snag some images quickly.
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Comet Holmes 20071025This shot is the second of a series taken on Thursday night (11/25/07). I took this shot of Comet Holmes without the barlow used in the first image. This (slightly) overexposed the inner portion of the comet, but nicely pulled in the surrounding stars to put the comet in perspective. Click on the image to see a higher resolution version.
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went out for a 2nd night of Comet Holmes… this was even better than the first Even the brightest full moon of the year couldn’t put a damper on the views. I pulled out the BIG scope just to get a feel for things. There is truly no substitute for aperture… 25″ worth of Obsession Dobsonian in this case. Anyway… I went back to the refractor to snag a couple of images. I exposed for a bit longer today… and revealed a greater extent in the comet and its surroundings.
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