At first I had planned to concentrate on Jupiter and Saturn, but it soon turned out, that this night will be extraordinary clear. I decided to give the 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann comet a chance. At the beginning I used the NIKON D70 but later on I also gave my old AlphaMini a chance.
Last Update: 28 April 2006
Comet Schwassmann-Wachmann 73P
A single image of 300s with no calibration frames taken (Camera in Noise reduction mode with current switched off during noise reduction. This stores an unmodified image. (C.Buil / Mode 3)). Crop out of center.
NIKON D70 at ISO1600
Stellarvue NightHawk (AT1010 / Classic) 80/480mm Achromatic Refractor / BAADER "Fringe Killer" Filter
27 April 2006 2130 UT / 300s
Image treated with ImagesPlus 2.75 and NeatImage and Paintshop Pro 9.01 (for higher JPG compression)
Comet Schwassmann-Wachmann 73P
This image has had all calibration frames. Also a crop out the center.
NIKON D70 at ISO1600
Stellarvue NightHawk (AT1010 / Classic) 80/480mm Achromatic Refractor / BAADER "Fringe Killer" Filter
27 April 2006 2056 UT / 10*30s
Image treated with ImagesPlus 2.75 and NeatImage and Paintshop Pro 9.01 (for higher JPG compression)
Comet Schwassmann-Wachmann 73P
Here I aligned on the comet which was moving rather fast .. surprisingly for me as I had never experienced something like this before.
Here I processed the alignment on the stars where the movement of the coment is obvious now. It moved from right to the left. Faintest stars are about 16 mag on this image.
OES AlphaMini CCD camera.772 x 580 Pixel (interlaced Mode) Philips FT800P 6.4 mm (horizontal) x 4.8 mm (vertikal), Pixelsize 8µm x 16µm
Stellarvue NightHawk (AT1010 / Classic) 80/480mm Achromatic Refractor / BAADER "Fringe Killer" Filter
27 April 2006 2148 UT / 20*120s = total of 40 minutes
Image treated with ImagesPlus 2.75 and NeatImage and Paintshop Pro 9.01 (for higher JPG compression)
M13 Globular Cluster
This image has had all calibration frames. Also a crop out the center.
NIKON D70 at ISO1600
Stellarvue NightHawk (AT1010 / Classic) 80/480mm Achromatic Refractor / BAADER "Fringe Killer" Filter
27 April 2006 2040 UT / 10*30s
Image treated with ImagesPlus 2.75 and NeatImage and Paintshop Pro 9.01 (for higher JPG compression)