Calm View, Wild Story

As seen on Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD). A photo composite of multiple exposures. From the photographer: “Okay, this was wild. Despite the promising forecast, I had to travel over 300 km to realize I would probably not take any shot of the comet 12P/Pons-Brooks on the evening of 5 March 2024. When reached Telgart, Slovakia, the sky was hopelessly cloudy. I knew I had roughly 2 hours to take some shots of the comet. I quickly decided to move south, towards the Revúca city. The whole way, truly thick fog was on the road. When I finally reached Revúca, the sky was clear, but I didn’t know this place at all so I was not able to find a spot with a view of the comet. Eventually, when I almost gave up and was returning back, I found a side road to a field, from where the comet was low over the horizon. No matter what, I started blindly the photography. Just on the site, I found out the composition is, actually nice with a distant tree, the fog illuminated by the passing cars, and the clouds were far enough to make this shot. Good luck in bad luck, indeed.”

Technical details:
Composite of 47 frames with a separate exposure for the foreground
Canon Ra, Tamron 70-200mm/200mm, f2.8, ISO 4000, 47x30s, tracked on Vixen Polarie U, Optolong L-Pro filter