Comet 73P (Schwassmann-Wachmann 3), Fragment C

A GIF animation of the comet's movement during 60 minutes, one 30-second exposure every 5 minutes. File size 2.0 MB, so it may take a while to load. See also a combined image made of exposures taken in part from this animation series, in higher resolution. The autoguider was trained on a star. The moon was setting, while morning twilight was increasing, so the background brightness remained about the same throughout this exposure series. The comet fragment was relatively faint, and the sky background bright, thus the individual exposures are somewhat grainy.

If the animation does not run smoothly in your web browser, you can save it to your harddisk and view it from there.

Click here to read a report of our comet observations during that night (in German).

73/P Frag. C

Exposure Data

Instrument: 4.9" f/3.8 Wright-Newtonian
F/stop: 3.8
Exposure: 13 x 30 seconds
Camera: modified Nikon D70 Digital SLR
Sensitivity: ISO 1600
Animation duration: 2:38 - 3:38 MESZ
Date: May 13, 2006
Location: Altenmarkt i.T., Lower Austria
Conditions: Visual limiting magnitude 4.0 mag, seeing 2, temperature 5°C, no wind, slight dew
Autoguider: Meade Pictor 216 XT, max. error: 0
Enhancement: IRIS 5.31, Adobe Photoshop CS2
Notes: Moonlight and morning twilight brightened the sky background. The autoguider was guiding a star.

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