Subject: Comet C/2006 XA1

Date: 10 April 2007, 21:33 to 23:35 UT

Notes:
Comet C/2006 XA1 was distant, small and dim and passing over a dense field of Milky Way stars. It is a testament to the dark skies of North Devon that I was able to record this comet at magnitude 13.6.

Animation: 21:39, 22:02, 22:22, 22:48, 23:04, 23:30 UT

Stills:
Image 1: 22:02 UT
Image 2: 23:04 UT

Location:
AstroAdventures, Kimworthy, Devon

Equipment:
Televue 85 APO scope
Televue x0.8 field flattener
Losmandy GM8 mount
Losmandy Gemini goto computer

Camera:
Canon 10D DSLR

Exposures:
25 x 5 minutes ISO 800

For dark calibration:
6 x 5 minutes ISO 800 min/max excluded averaged,

For flat field calibration:
16 x 1/180 sec ISO 100 min/max excluded averaged
Daylight sky through two white cotton layers

Images Plus:
Converted to TIFF (Daylight WB)
Calibrated (master dark, master flat)
Aligned
Stacked (min/max excluded average)
Digital Development Processing

Photoshop:
Levels
Curves
Colour balance and saturation

Focus: DSLRFocus software