ISON Observed!

Well, after a couple of previous attempts to locate comet ISON, with the sky cooperating and my ability to use my new equipment gaining ground every time I go out, I can finally report that I actually observed this elusive comet for the first time. For what was being hailed as the "Comet of the Century" (I know, high hopes; after all, comets are fickle – they’re like cats, they do what they want) I was a bit disappointed in how dim ISON was, as I had expected it to be close to naked-eye visibility by now. Shining at magnitude 8 (maybe!) it was fairly easy to pick out in the field of view of my 23mm (125x) eyepiece. The CGEM-DX mount really makes astronomy a fun time for us ‘old’ guys as you just dial-in the coordinates and off you go. That is, of course, as long as the mount is aligned properly to north and the coordinates you have for the object are correct. Mount aligned, check – coordinates good, oops! Turns out that Stellarium gave me the wrong info as I hadn’t updated the dataset in a while. Once I corrected that problem and entered the updated coordinates, ISON was right there in the field of the eyepiece.

Displaying a faint, diffuse coma and just a hint of a nucleus, I was not able to make out any tail. Before the twilight started to take over I quickly took a set of exposures using my Canon 50D mounted piggyback on the scope. Results were as expected – fair at best. The sky was definitely getting a bit bright and I think there were a few high cirrus clouds gathering about. After processing the ten images with Nebulosity (30sec images; f6.3, FL=200mm) I got the 5 minute photo seen below.

Comet C/2012 S1 - ISON
5 min 200mm F6.3

Comet ISON wasn’t the only visitor to the early morning sky this day. Comet Lovejoy (C/2013 R1) was well placed high in the south-east sky, and it turns out was much brighter than ISON and easy to see in the 23mm Luminous ocular. Sporting a rather large coma with a well-defined nucleus and a short thin tail, Lovejoy was a ‘joy’ to observe.

Comet C/2013 R1 - Lovejoy
6 min 200mm f6.3

I’m still holding out hope that ISON will brighten more before too long. As long as the weather holds up I’ll be at it again in the next days and later this month. With the moon entering the picture and ISON getting lower in the eastern sky it will be more challenging to get that great photo.