This is the first of what will be many posts on this comet. Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks will be in the western sky in the evening for the next few months and could brighten enough to be visible to the unaided eye. Right now, however, it is quite dim at a magnitude of +9.0 and is located near the star Vega in the constellation Lyra.
Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks in the constellation Lyra and near the bright star Vega.Current location of Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks in the solar system.Screen shot from Stellarium showing the location of 12P/Pons-Brooks, Vega, and the constellation Lyra. Rectangle shows the field of view for the 180mm lens.
Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks is a cryovolcanic comet. When exposed to the sun’s warmth the pressure within this cryomagma builds up until it triggers the release of gases, expelling icy fragments (and the gases) through cracks in the comet’s outer layer and into space. 12P has already had multiple bursts which have resulted in rapid brightening.
I ventured to Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument, an International Dark Sky Park, to shoot images of the comet. As noted above, it very close to the bright star Vega which made it very easy to find. My primary goal was to use my Nikon 180mm f/2.8 AIS lens, a legacy manual focus lens known for value in astrophotography and so that I could capture the full constellation. My secondary plan was to use the Nikon 200-500mm lens at its maximum zoom showing just Vega and 12P.
Owing to being a bit out of practice (it happens), both my focussing and star tracking were suboptimal. Something to work on for my next shoot.
This comet was discovered by Japanese amateur astronomer Hideo Nishimura. It was briefly visible in the morning twilight but became increasingly difficult as it got closer to the sun and was lost in the glare. It will very briefly be the evening sky this week but, again, the glare of the Sun may make it difficult to see.
Here are a few images taken in the pre-dawn hours on 08 September. In the foreground is Wukoki Pueblo in Wupatki National Monument.
Comet C/2023 P1 Nishimura at 0449 MST 08 September 2023.A tight crop of the previous image.Comet C/2023 P1 Nishimura at 0454 MST 08 September 2023. This is just a few minutes later than the previous image but the sky is already getting very bright.
Nikon D750, 85mm, f/2.8, ISO 3200, 10×3 seconds and stacked using Starry Landscape Stacker to reduce noise.
Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) continues to be a interesting object in the night sky for photography, telescopes, and binoculars. Unfortunately, it never got bright enough to be an easy object for the unaided eye. One could sometimes see it when viewing it from very dark locations without the Moon present–but usually only with averted vision. At its brightest it was reported to have reached magnitude +5. The comet should fade rather rapidly in February and may be as faint as magnitude +8 by the end of the month.
The comet made its closest approach to the sun on 12 January 2023 (1.11 AU; 166 million km) and its closest approach to Earth on 01 February 2023 (0.28 AU; 42 million km). See the included Solar System map that shows the location of the comet relative to Earth or visit TheSkyLive.com for an interactive version.
Schematic diagram showing position of Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) relative to other bodies in the Solar System.
Here are a few of the better images I have been able to capture of the comet over the past few weeks. These have used a variety of lenses but always the same camera, tripod, and star tracker.
These photos were taken on 22 January 2023 using a manual focus Nikon NIKKOR 80-200mm f/4 AI-S zoom lens. This lens has the advantage of having a hard stop at ∞ making it very easy to focus. Image stacking was done using Deep Sky Stacker.
Both of these images of the comet show the tail (pointing up) and the antitail (pointing down). From Wikipedia:
An antitail is an apparent spike projecting from a comet’s coma which seems to go towards the Sun, and thus geometrically opposite to the other tails: the ion tail and the dust tail. However, this phenomenon is an optical illusion that is seen from the Earth…
Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) with tail and antitail. Images were stacked using Deep Sky Stacker with both stars and comet fixed.Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) with tail and antitail. Images were stacked using Deep Sky Stacker with comet fixed but stars allowed to move.
And here is a time-lapse movie of the motion of the comet during the period 0359 through 0435 MST.
Time-lapse video of Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) from 0358–0454 MST 22 January 2023.
A few days later I was able to capture both the dust tail and the ion tail. Stacking was done using Deep Sky Stacker. This was shot with the Nikon NIKKOR ED 180mm f/2.8 AI-S manual focus lens.
Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) showing both the dust trail and ion trail on 28 January 2023.
Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) with Mars and Pleiades star cluster.A closer view of Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) with Mars and Pleiades star cluster and the Taurus Molecular Cloud.
Time-lapse video of Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) and Mars from 1926–2029 MST 10 February 2023.
Lastly, a time-lapse video of the motion of the comet also shows a plethora of satellites moving across the sky.
Later this week the comet will pass close to the Hyades star cluster. If skies are clear I’ll be back out shooting more photos of the comet.
Note: Both of the videos incorrectly label the comet ZTH rather than ZTF.
There is a new comet currently visible through telescopes, binoculars and long-exposure photographs in the morning skies—and there are expectations that the comet will become bright enough to be seen with the unaided eye in the coming weeks.
Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard) with M3 and two meteors at 0450 MST 03 December 2021.
Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard) was discovered by G. J. Leonard at the Mount Lemmon Observatory in early January 2021. The comet will make its closest approach to Earth on 12 December 2021 (~35 million km). It will make its closest approach to the Sun on 3 January 2022 and then will head out of the Solar System.
It has a current estimated magnitude of around +6 and is expected to brighten to +4 as it nears the Sun. Some forecasts call for a brightening to magnitude +2 making it visible even in the twilight hours. It is becoming likely that this will be the brightest comet of 2021.
This was my first attempt to photograph the comet. It was barely visible in binoculars (7×50) but was easily seen with even a short exposure on the camera. I set the camera to take 60 second exposures for an hour—at which time astronomical twilight would begin to brighten the eastern sky.
The photograph at the top was taken just a few minutes after the start of the session and shows two meteors (one bright and the other fairly dim) passing through the same portion of the sky as the comet. Also visible in the photograph is Messier 3 (M3 or NGC 5272), a globular cluster made up of around a half million stars.
Below is a time-lapse animation of the images collected during that hour. The comet is moving at an ultrafast speed of ~71 km/second relative to Earth and that fast motion is easily seen in the animation.
Time-lapse imagery showing the motion of the comet from 0450–0550 MST on 03 December 2021.
I hope to have more opportunities to photograph this comet in both the morning sky and later in the month in the evening sky—especially if it brightens significantly.
A faint comet is currently moving through the sky in the constellation Orion. Unfortunately, it is too dim (mag. +8) to seen by the unaided eye but binoculars, a small telescope, or most digital cameras will be adequate to see it.
Comet C/2020 M3 (ATLAS) moving through the constellation Orion.
As the comet was moving near the belt of Orion I captured about one hours worth of exposures and then did the typical stacking using Deep Sky Stacker. Post processing was done with rnc-color-stretch.
The comet is located to the right and slightly below the belt of Orion. The future path of the comet can be found at in-the-sky.org.
