Comet and Arcturus

Comet C/2013 US10 (Catalina) on 29-Dec-2015 at between half-past five and six o'clock a.m. (Eastrern European Time) from Kyiv (Osokorky) in a rare clear (and frosty: -8*C) night which occurred for a long period of cloudy weather. A green spot in the lower-right quadrant is the comet; a bright orange star is Arcturus -- Alpha Boötes.

Comet's tails are dimmer than on 8-Dec, probably because of bigger distance between the comet and the Sun: at the time of shooting it was 171 million km while on 8-Dec the distance was 138 million km only so the comet's activity declined. The tails are visible in the second black-and-white picture with enhanced contrast.

Equipment: Canon EOS 600D + EF 50mm f/1.8 II on a fixed tripod.
Image made by averaging of 100 frames with exposure of 4s; ISO=3200; f/2.5.
Software: DeepSkyStacker; FITStacker; RawTherapee.

Visual move of the comet on the stars' background during observation (about half an hour):

An orange star above the comet is HIP 69585 with a visual magnitude of about 6.5m.

Each frame of this animated GIF is composed of 10 initial frames (with exposure of 4s each).

Here is a simulation of comet's orbit (from http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/) for a period from my first observation (8 Dec) to the current:

Speed relative to Sun is ~39.4 km/s [on 29-Dec at 5:30 EET by http://www.heavens-above.com]
The comet is hyperbolic, so it will leave the Solar System.

Moon with Earthshine and Venus

Moon (with earthshine) and Venus
8-Dec-2015 5:48 EET (UT+2)

Canon EOS 600D + EF 50mm f/1.8; ISO 200; 1/2s; f/2.2

Comet and Venus

Yet another variant of picture taken on 08-Dec-2015 with comet C/2013 US10 (Catalina) and Venus.

Canon EOS 600D + EF 50mm f/1.8 on tripod; 100x3s frames (05:59-06:09 EET (UT+2)); ISO=3200; f/2.2; DSS+FITStacker+RawTherapee.


After cropping and removing gradient:

Variant with smoothing:

Comet C/2013 US10 (CATALINA): tails

The comet shooted by Canon EOS 600D + EF 50mm f/1.8 on tripod this morning before dawn.

Two tails of the comet have different composition. Ionised gases are blown by sunwind to a direction opposite to the Sun (a tail directed to the right and upwards); dusty tail directed downwards; comet moves to the left and upwards.

Serie of frames was taken 08-Dec-2015 between 05:59 and 06:19 EET (UT+2)

Resulted images are sum of 200 frames; each frame exposure is 3s.

Other parameters: ISO=3200; f/2.2.

Software: DeepSkyStacker, FITStacker, RawTherapee.

Comet's orbit (by calsky.com):

Comet C/2013 US10 (CATALINA) (continuation)

The comet C/2013 US10 (CATALINA) with Venus and Moon this morning (~5:45 EET (UT+2))
Bright coronas around light orbs are dominated in the picture because of monring haze.

Comet C/2013 US10 (CATALINA)

Weather forecast predicted clear sky this morning so I made an attemt to catch  C/2013 US10 (CATALINA) comet. Unfortunatelly, while I was preparing camera, unexpected clouds appeared.

The brightest objects are Moon and Venus. Time: 5:41 EET (UT+2) (07-Dec-2015)

The comet is marked in the zoomed part of the picture (Venus is on the right):

Canon EOS 600D + EF-S 18-55mm (kit)
Conditions: Exposure = 13s; f/4.5; ISO=1600; F=18mm