Comet 73P Schwassman-Wachmann 3 and M57
It was mostly cloudy last evening just as the comet was passing near M57, the ring nebula in Lyra. Fortunately for me, it cleared slightly and I was able to get some images even though they are all through thin clouds. Equipment used Celestron Nexstar11 telescope, Meade F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam2 video camera. Stellacam2 set to 64 frame integration (about 2 sec), gain 9/14, and medium gamma. No wind, poor transparency, turbulence 6/10, temperature 53 °F.
An animated version is available as well (approximately 1.5 M-Bytes).
May 8th, 2006 at 2:46 pm
AWESOME animation!
May 8th, 2006 at 5:00 pm
Dang! I knew I should have toughed it out and stayed awake.Great job as usual!.
May 8th, 2006 at 7:13 pm
Thanks Rob, Andrew!
Not the greatest images, others did far better. I managed to setup the camera a bit off-axis which caused some skewed flare on the stars especially towards the top. Clear skies and a location a timezone or two further east would have helped as well. I’m actually quite glad I got to see it at all, given mostly cloudy skies here.