Zlender Image of Comet Hale-Bopp

8K
Observer: Udo Zlender
Location: Bonn, Germany
Date: March 12, 1997 20:06:11 UT

This image of the nucleus of comet Hape-Bopp was made under worst conditions. The comet appeared next to a street light, and the whole location was blanketed by fog. It was impossible to see anything of the nucleus even with the help of a pair of 7x50 glasses. But the long exposure time of 8 seconds (to be compared with a quite similar image I took 3 days before with 0.3 sec exp. time ) gave an impression of the nuclear region as it appears, when viewing the comet through the telescope under better conditions.

Camera: OES-LCCD14 2x2 pixel binning mode , 12 bits AD-resolution
Telescope: 1760mm F/6.3 Celestron C11 with focal reducer
Tracking: automatic on Losmandy G11
Outside temp: 5 deg Celsius
Filter: None
CCD-temp: -4 deg Celsius
Orientation: North is up
Humidity: very high
Notes: Urban environment. Fog.
Time of observation: 20:06:11 UT
Exp. time: 8.0 sec 
Processing: dark subtracted, log scaled

Back to Home Page