Comet NEOWISE Zoomed In

After my success capturing comet NEOWISE with my camera I thought it might be possible to see it more zoomed in with my telescope. Initially I thought a comet might be too large and I wouldn’t be able to fit the tail into a telescope image, but after being blessed with a second night of good weather I figured I had to try.

I packed the dobsonian telescope into the car and headed to a deserted strip mall with a good northwestern view. My telescope isn’t motorized so it can’t track, which means my shutter speed is limited to ~1-2 seconds max.

I used a 2 second shutter and the highest my ISO would go (25600). That’s obviously a ludicrously high ISO so I took 6 pictures and stacked them in DeepSkyStacker to try and average out some of the sensor noise. I made some slight level adjustments in darktable to darken the background sky and make the tail a bit more noticeable.

I used my 8” telescope, 2x barlow lens, and my Fuji XA2 camera.

It’s not the greatest photo of comet NEOWISE you’ll find on the internet, but it’s mine and I’m proud of it!