Bright Comet NEOWISE (C/2020 F3) rising in the northeast into the dawn sky on July 5, 2020, visible here as the small spot left of centre in the bright twilight. The northeast sky was also filled with noctilucent clouds (NLCs) that grew even more extensive this morning as the Sun angle below the horizon decreased and the NLCs lit up more to cover much of the sky. Venus is bright to the right, with the Pleiades start cluster above Venus. Capella is the bright star at top left. The comet is in a line directly down from Capella and just above the orange band of twilight. In all, this was one of the most amazing morning sky scenes I have seen. What’s more, just after I took this series, the International Space Station flew over. Another image captures that scene. This was from home in Alberta at about 3:57 am MDT under very clear skies. The comet had passed perihelion only a few days eariler and was emerging here into the dawn sky. This is a panorama of 4 segments at 1.6 seconds each with the 50mm Sigma lens and Canon 6D MkII at ISO 100. Stitched with Adobe Camera Raw.
The late-night spring Milky Way from my rural backyard in Alberta (latitude 51° N) on a fine May night in 2020, with the waxing Moon just setting and lighting the landscape and sky. Jupiter (brightest) and Saturn to the east (left) are just rising together at left, east of the Milky Way. West of the galactic centre at right is red Antares in Scorpius. The Small Sagittarius and Scutum starclouds are prominent at centre, with their various Messier nebulas and star clusters visible. This is a stack of 4 x 2-minute tracked exposures for the untrailed sky blended with a stack of 4 x 2-minute untracked exposures for the sharp ground, with the 20mm Nikon F-mount Sigma Art lens on the Canon EOS Ra camera using the Metabones Nikon F to EOS R lens adapter. I shot this as a test of the lens adapter. Taken May 27/28, 2020. The camera was on the iOptron SkyGuider Pro tracker.
