Picture of the week

Comet and an Oak 

Comet Neowise over an oak tree.  Photographed in the foothills east of Sacramento at 10:37 PM on 7/19/20.  The trick was finding an isolated and attractive oak tree on a high enough ridge facing the necessary direction for the comet while also having enough distance from the oak tree to get a reasonable proportion in the size between the two subjects. One other challenge is the amount of light pollution near Sacramento that tends to make the comet dimmer in contrast to the sky. This is further aggravated by brighter sky as the comet gets lower to the horizon.  If it wasn't for the convience of this area, ideally one should try such photography in a more remote area.  You can see another shot captured about an hour later as the comet got lower in the horizon that enabled a tighter shot with the tree, but subsequently diminished by the brighter horizon.

Photographed using a Canon EOS 90D with a 100-400mm L f/4.5-5.6 mk 2 lens on a tripod with a cable trigger.  Settings: ISO 1600, f/5.6, 5 sec, WB of 3900K, mirror lockup mode, and long exposure noise reduction on.

A few days earlier a different exposure was captured of just the comet using my larger 500mm f/4 L lens.  See the following photograph for the results of this.  Settings: ISO 1600, f/4, 0.8 sec, mirror lockup mode, and long exposure noise reduction on.  White balance was adjusted manually in post-production.