A Comet, A Planet & A Nebula

It was a short night observing with the Society at Stargard on 17th January, due to the late sunset. Most of the attention was on Comet Lovejoy but I also caught a couple of shots of Jupiter and made my first hurried attempt at M42, The Great Orion Nebula, whilst in equatorial mode.

2015-01-17 Comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy 4x60sec f10 2000mm ISO2500

Details from the Calsky prediction for 17th January 2015: Comet ‘C/2014 Q2′ Magnitude= 4.2mag
Best seen from 21.2h – 1.1h (htop=36° at NNW at 21.2h) (in constellation Aries)
RA= 3h17m23s Dec=+19°22.1’ (J2000), hourly motion: 347.8″/h Position angle=327.8° dRA=-13.3sec/h dDec=293.6″/h, Distance to Sun= 1.30AU, Distance to Earth= 0.53AU, Elongation=115°, h=35.6° az=347.3°/NNW, Sun elevation=-12°, Elongation from Moon center=157°, Moon elevation=-37°, Moon phase=13%
Position angle of ion tail=82° (re zenith=273°), Length of a 0.06AU long tail=3.7°, Position angle of dust trail (not tail)=147° (re zenith=339°), Orbit direction=61° (away from Earth), Latitude of Earth above orbit plane=-42°

Jupiter, showing the equatorial belts:

2015-01-17 Jupiter (0.1sec, 2000mm, f/10 ISO 100).

Jupiter over-exposed to show the four Galilean Moons:

2015-01-17 Ganymede, Callisto, Jupiter (overexposed), Europa & Io, (0.5 sec, 2000mm, f/10, ISO 6400)

M42, The Great Nebula in Orion:

2015-01-17 M42 1x30sec 1×10 sec 1x 5 sec f10 2000mm ISO2500DSS HDR PS

This is not a particularly good image of M42 but I hope to try and improve on it with more detail and accuracy, as it has shown me some potential for what I can do now that I have begun the process of converting my telescope to equatorial mode.

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All images © R.Powell