Comet Wirtanen (aka 46P) at centre here, and to the east of the Type M red giant star Menkar in Cetus. This was the evening of December 10, 2018. The comet was easily visible to the naked eye as a fuzzy spot, though you had to know where to look. As as side note, the star Menkar is also known as Alpha Ceti, and in the Star Trek movie The Wrath of Khan, Khan was imprisoned on planet V circling Ceti Alpha. This is a stack of 9 x 1-minute exposures with the Canon 135mm L series lens at f/2.2, and Canon 6D MkII at ISO 1250, all aligned on the stars, plus a stack of 3 exposures taken consecutively aligned for the core and blended in with a luminosity mask to minimize trailing on the core. The camera was on the Star Adventurer Mini tracker, taken from home in southern Alberta.
Comet Wirtanen (aka 46P) at lower right near the star Menkar in Cetus, as the comet moves north toward Taurus at top, with Orion at left. This was the evening of December 10, 2018. The comet was easily visible to the naked eye as a fuzzy spot, though you had to know where to look. This is a stack of 6 x 2-minute exposures with the Canon 35mm L series lens at f/3.2, and Canon 6D MkII at ISO 1250, on the Star Adventurer Mini tracker, taken from home in southern Alberta.
This was Comet Wirtanen / 46P on December 8, 2018 with it traveling north through Eridanus about to enter Taurus for its encounter in a week or so with the Hyades and Pleiades star clusters. Orion is to the left, and Taurus with the Pleiades at top. The comet is the green glow at bottom right. This is a stack of 6 x 2-minute exposures, tracked on the Star Adventurer Mini, with the Canon 35mm L lens at f/2.8 and Canon 6D MkII (stock) at ISO 1000. Bands of red and brown airglow discolour the field, a common sight in this southerly area of the sky from home. I can rarely shoot wide-angle shots of Orion and not have it tinted with airglow. This was from home in southern Alberta at latitude 51° N.
