Comet Panstarrs C/2011 L4
Comet in Ursa Minor
For June 8th, 2013

Uploaded 6/9/13

 
 This is the deepest shot of the comet yet with our 8 inch astrograph up in Happy Jack under pristine dark skies. The comet has now faded so much, around 10th magnitude - that it was just barely visible in the 8 inch visually with a wide field ocular. This shot which still clearly reveals the anti tail as a sunward extension toward the Sun (to the left is West) and the normal fan tail is reappearing starting at the bottom right of the nucleus and wrapping around clockwise. This is a deep one hour accumulated exposure, guided on the comets head for maximum clarity as it traveled among the stars for an hour.

Conventional image, as seen by the camera normally. Select an image size for a larger view: 800 x 600 1290 x 960 1600 x 1200

Negative image, to show tails and coma inner details better Select an image size for a larger view: 1290 x 960

Heavily pushed negative image, which reveals the full extent of the fan tails Select an image size for a larger view: 1290 x 960

Color mapped image, to show the faint outer tail extensions better Select an image size for a larger view: 1290 x 960
Lens: Orion 8" f/4 Astrograph with Baader MPC Coma Corrector Platform: Home made GEM Exposure: 12 x 5m = 1 hour total Location: Happy Jack, Arizona Elevation: 6800 ft. Sky: Seeing 7/10, Transparency 9/10 Outside Temperature: 50F Processing Tools: Maxim DSLR, Photoshop CS2 HOME GALAXIES EMISSION NEBS REFLECTION NEBS COMETS GLOBULARS OPEN CLUST PLANETARIES LINKS