Comet 38P/Stephan-Oterma

[rwilkinson]

This comet is in Gemini at the moment: 9th magnitude but quite diffuse.
I first managed to detect it in the middle of last month, using my windowsill observatory:

The comet (from my windowsill) on 18th October. 33x 90-sec with 200mm lens at f/6.3.

38p_18oct.png (314.21 KiB) Viewed 2009 times

It didn't rise above the trees until around 1am, so I had to stop up quite late to get this, and then needed my Invisible Comet-Stacker program to process the images.
Then a couple of weeks ago I got some data back from the OU's COAST telescope on Tenerife:

The comet from Tenerife on 5th November. 2x 150-sec with C14 at f/10.

38p_5nov.png (172.63 KiB) Viewed 2009 times

And last night I had another go from my windowsill:

The comet (from my windowsill) on 17th November. 29x 90-sec with 200mm lens at f/6.3.

38p_17nov.png (93.77 KiB) Viewed 2009 times

At least it's clear of the trees by 11pm now, but I still couldn't see the comet on my individual images, so it still counts as an "invisible" comet for now.
Hopefully next month I'll be able to catch it much better using my C8 down in the garden...

[rwilkinson]

Last night I managed to get an image of this comet from my garden.
I had to wait until after 11pm for it to clear the trees, and then the bright moonlight reduced the contrast, so I didn't get much of its coma.

Comet 38P on 21-Nov. 15x 90-sec with Atik 16IC on 80mm f/6.

38p_21nov.png (174.74 KiB) Viewed 1969 times