Comet 2012 F6 Lemmon is definitely developing a tail!
Reports have emerged recently of Lemmon (currently in the southernmost constellation of Octans) developing gas and dust tails. So, after two cancelled MAS observing nights due to very unpredictable weather here in Macarthur, I spent a couple of hours out the back last night taking more images of the comet that I have been following in the South over the last few weeks.
The clouds came and went:
Picture of Comet Lemmon, to the left of the tree top, behind the clouds.
Despite this, I eventually captured this image of Comet 2012 F6 Lemon. The uncontrolled light pollution from Campbelltown is evident.
Comet 2012 F6 Comet Lemmon. Polarie mount, Canon 60D camera, 200mm lens, 6' 40" exposure, f/4.5, ISO 1600. Below is Omega Octanis, far left is Delta Octanis, bottom left is Pi Octanis.
Click to enlarge.
Still not quite accurate enough with my polar aligning the Polarie mount (I use a Polarie Meter which has a compass, level and declination setting) but that's another story. I'm just pleased I got one of Lemmon's two very faint tails.
Lemmon was also visible through 7x50 binoculars as a fuzzy object, using averted vision.
The comet is green/blue in my earlier images but is whiter in this image, due to over-exposing the nucleus to try and capture the tail. Single frames were still coloured. This image is a combination of 20 stacked images of 20 seconds each, totalling 400 seconds. The reason for this is to avoid star trailing due to a combination of inaccurate polar alignment and the use of a high powered camera lens, which the Polarie was not intended for.
Hopefully a dark sky site opportunity will arise in the next few days (before the Moon interferes again).