Saturday, July 18, 2020

Another View of the Comet


I thought I would try for another view of the comet, this time after sunset, as opposed to sunrise when I last saw Comet NEOWISE.  I went to the park in Sea Cliff that overlooks the water, and this time I was successful in seeing it.  The comet is further away now and fainter, and of course it is still in the light polluted skies of the New York Metropolitan Area.  It was not visible at all with the naked eye.  There must have been 15 people in the park and almost everyone was wearing masks which was great!   I found the comet by scanning the sky with my 10x50 binoculars, and then it took me a while to get the comet in the camera.  I would shoot a picture of the sky, look at it on the back of the camera, then move the camera, shoot again, and so on.  Really tedious.  But I did find it.  There were a number of younger people and I thought that with their younger eyes they might see it, but they couldn't see it either.  So what I did was get a good photo then display it on the back of the camera, then enlarge the displayed image, and I called people over to look at the back of the camera so they could say they saw the comet.  They were so appreciative.  But here's the cool thing...


When I first walked into the park, just carrying my binoculars, I saw this fellow with his beautiful home made Dobsonian telescope!  His name is Scott and it is his first ever telescope and he did a beautiful job building it!  So we had fun talking for a bit while waiting for the sky to get dark before looking for the comet.  A father and son showed up, and the father has on his shoulder, something that looks like a baseball bat.  It's not, it's a telescope that I think he said his father used in WWII to look for ships.  So they were fascinated with Scott's telescope.  It was a pretty rich evening with all the talk and telescopes and cameras, and of course, the comet.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like a wonderful evening of sharing. Where is the photo of the WWII telescope?
Joan

Anonymous said...

That was so nice of you to share your photo of the comet with people in the park. Just like you're sharing with us. What a pleasant evening. betsey

Ken Spencer said...

The WWII telescope is on the right shoulder of the child's father, on the right in the picture. It looks like a baseball bat!