The Comet ISON Tripple Conjunction with Mars and Regulus October 14th, 2013

Uploaded 10/15/13

 Yesterday morning we were presented with an unusual and spectacular sight in the eastern sky, about an hour before the first light of twilight started at 4am. Not only was there a stunning pair of bright gems rising in the east, the pair was accompanied by the much fainter Comet ISON, still very faint forming a perfect line with the duo. This image was taken with my 80mm f/4.8 Zeiss APO on a german equatorial mount on my balcony on the back of my house in Payson.

Two images are presented below, the top image we have the view the eye saw, with north to the right and the pair in a horizontal line along the eastern horizon. Mars is the salmon orange gem in the middle, and the bright star Regulus, the blue diamond on the right. On the left side of the image, you can see ISON, now around 12th magnitude but brightening rapidly for a solar conjunction in about a month. It could reach naked eye brightness then.

The bottom image is in portrait mode, and is presented astronomically correct with north up. The field here is roughly 4 degrees tall.

I tried in vain to see the comet in the Zeiss 11 x 80 binoculars, but it was still too faint to see clearly.

Select an image size for a larger view: 1024 x 768 1600 x 1200
Select an image size for a larger view: 1024 x 768 1600 x 1200
Lens: 12.5" f/5 Home bult Newtonian Platform: Astrophysics AP1200 Exposure: 2h RGB Location: Payson, Arizona Elevation: 5150 ft. Sky: Seeing 7/10, Transparency 8/10 Outside Temperature: 40F Processing Tools: Maxim DL, Photoshop CS2 HOME GALAXIES EMISSION NEBS REFLECTION NEBS COMETS GLOBULARS OPEN CLUST PLANETARIES LINKS