Comet Lulin Images, Near Regulus In Leo
by Kevin Brown : last updated: March 13, 2009Welcome back!
At last, the skies over Kent cleared last night for a few hours. I was finally able to photograph Comet Lulin.
This is something of a relief…
For the past three weeks, I’ve been making maps of Lulin’s projected position for literally thousands of visitors.
Lulin close to Regulus, plus "streak", Feb 27th
What if I hadn’t seen it myself?
Anyway, I have now. :)
The image on the right shows Lulin close to the star Regulus, in the constellation of Leo.
Between them is an orange ”streak”. I’m not sure exactly what it was, probably an aircraft. But it’s interesting.
(PS. It has since been pointed out… if you look carefully, you can see the periodically flashing white and double-red lights, of a high-flying aircraft)
The image was captured with my Canon 1000D dslr camera, through the ED80 600 mm focal length refractor.
It’s a single frame of 2 minute exposure at ISO 800.
I actually took about 15 frames with different exposure times. I shall try my hand at stacking some of the best, to see if I can produce better images after processing.
Here’s the best single frame shot of Lulin I have found, so far. It was a 3 minute exposure. You can see from the star shapes, there is some tracking error. I need to work on a better North alignment of the mount.
Comet Lulin, February 27th (click for larger)
I am sure that I can still see the comet Lulin in the sky from my house in Rutland – it is a green sparkle to the south east of the moon. Is this possible – All the info about it says that it has gone.
Hi Jane,
Comet Lulin has faded greatly now, as it moves out into the Solar System, further away from the Earth and Sun.
However, it may still visible within the constellation of Gemini, under good conditions.
All the best
Kevin