As forecast the sky cleared around 2am after rain and the transparency was very good this morning at 5. The Moon is getting closer to the comet but it is now only a thick crescent so is becoming less of a problem. Since the comet is still too low for my main telescope I drove to a dark site east of Chelmsford and set up there.
At around 5:30 I had set up my imaging equipment (Canon EOS550D + 200mm, f/2.8L lens on a Vixen Sphinx mount) and so started searching with 10×50 bins. The comet was definitely easier to see in the bins than my last chance a week ago but the conditions were a lot better.
This image is a stack of 22 x 30s exposures from 05:41 – 05:54 not tracked on the comet. The dust trail and gas tail show up nicely.
