C/2018 V1 (Machholz-Fujikawa-Iwamoto) 2018-Nov-19 Chris Schur

This newly discovered comet is very low in the east before sunrise, and we set up on the balcony with the portable mount to see over the trees to get an image with the Mead 622 Comet Tracker astrograph. The Fires in California are very bad right now, and the smoke has wiped out most of the sky here in Arizona. This comet was right in the worst part of the smoke, but I gave it a try anyway because it will be plunging into the solar glare in a week or so. The field of view here is 3 degrees with this setup. It was at the limit of detectability visually with this instrument.

Lens: Meade 622 Cometracker Astrograph with Baader MPCC coma corrector
Platform: Meade LDX5
Camera: Canon XTI
Exposure: 15m
Location: Payson, Arizona
Elevation: 5150 ft.
Sky: Seeing 7/10, Transparency 1/10
Outside Temperature: 25F
Processing Tools: Maxim DL, Photoshop CS2