Jan 072018
These images were taken the evening of the 4th of January. So, between the images taken on the 3rd and 4th the Earth – Comet distance closed to only 20.5 million miles.
| The comet has now passed into the northern constellation Camelopardalis (the giraffe) and the brightest star that becomes visible in the animation is Alpha Camelopardalis. This star is naked eye visible at a magnitude of 4.26. Unfortunately, the stars brightness combined with the 300 second exposure caused problems with the processing. The anti-blooming steps left strong visible artifacts in a couple of the images, but luckily they did not impact the image of the comet. |
 The PTO’s tree obstructed view of the sky. |