Comets?

[Manok101]

One of the few night sky objects I have yet to see, in any format, visual, binocs, or telescope. I was wondering, do they look like images you see of them, or are they like nebula and a greyish color, but you know what you're looking at? Or is it something that just takes a little practice in seeing?

[russ.will]

I suspect the latter part of this year and, if all the speculation amounts to what it suggests, the early part of next year, will provide you with a view of a comet that exceeds all expectations.

Russell

[badgerchap]

I saw Hale-Bopp in (I think) the 90's through a pair of knackered old terrestrial binos (about 7x40's I think) and it was a beautiful blue and green colour. It hung around for ages, and we were lucky enough to see it on a night with a lunar eclipse and then it even showed colour to the naked eye. If we are lucky enough to get anythin even remotely close to that kind of brightness, I expect you will see something quite spectacular through decent equipment. Comen Ison is looking very tasty.

[cantab]

I've never seen one (because I've never looked for one), but considering the Messier catalogue is a catalogue of objects that look like comets but aren't, at least through Messier's telescopes, I figure they'll typically look like faint fuzzies.

[Toxic Coolaid]

I got this a couple weeks ago. Comet C/2012 K5 Linear on 1-7-2013

SkyWatcher 80mm ED woth .85 FR

CGEM

Canon 60Da with CLS filter

each frame is 60 seconds at 1600 ISO. This comet was moving very fast and had trailing with subs longer than 60 seconds

http://mophopix.smug...56299&k=GNT8Jvm

[Toxic Coolaid]

this is the best I could do with a stack in DSS

[Caelus]

One of the few night sky objects I have yet to see, in any format, visual, binocs, or telescope. I was wondering, do they look like images you see of them, or are they like nebula and a greyish color, but you know what you're looking at? Or is it something that just takes a little practice in seeing?

I'm surprised you don't remember Hale-Bopp back in 1997... it was hanging around in the sky for weeks. I don't recall if there was much colour to it visually, but it was a lot more than a "faint fuzzy"!

[zakkhogan]

and we had hyakutake just before that... what an amazing time I was 14 at the time,

[Bluey]

I saw my first comet a few weeks ago, 168P/Hergenrother, and it was very faint and hard to spot, just a dot with a hint of a tail. I was chuffed to find it and will definitely be looking for some more. Hopefully Ison will be a bit easier to spot later in the year, fingers crossed.

[DazC]

I got this a couple weeks ago. Comet C/2012 K5 Linear on 1-7-2013

SkyWatcher 80mm ED woth .85 FR

CGEM

Canon 60Da with CLS filter

each frame is 60 seconds at 1600 ISO. This comet was moving very fast and had trailing with subs longer than 60 seconds

http://mophopix.smug...56299&k=GNT8Jvm

Love the animation, i didn't realize comets moved so quickly through the ep fov.

Thanks for sharing.

D.C

[J_M_Franklin]

I saw Comet Halley back in 1985 and comet Bradfield in 1987...since then I have missed them all

Hope to change that this year..

[Double Kick Drum]

At 13 years old when Halley put in its once in every 76 year appearance, I was slightly underwhelmed. I think it was one of its weakest showings in recent centuries.

More recently I have managed Hartley, Garradd and Hergenrother.

It would have been nice to have a crack at Linear but weather / events conspired against me.

Panstarrs in March / April and Ison late in the year will hopefully more than make up for that.

[badgerchap]

Oh yeah, forgot about Garradd. Saw it with the Dob, but it was pretty early on so couldn't see much. Thought it was M31 at first but there was a sort of essence of colour, but that could well have been imaginary!

[pete_l]

If you're talking eyeballing a comet (as opposed to "cheating" with a telescope ) then most aren't that special. Obviously there are the headline makers, but apart from them they can be difficult to see. For example Ikeya-Zhang-2002 in this photo:

The problem is that they tend to be close to the sun when they become naked eye objects, so they're often lost in the sunset or sunrise. If you haven't spotted it yet, it's just below the centre of the image, tail pointing up.