Comet LINEAR was closest to Earth on 1st January 2013 while in the constellation of Auriga. This was the last time I was able to image this execedingly fast moving comet as it remained cloudy for the whole of January and by February the comet was south of Orion and no brighter than 11th magnitude.
The blue star on the left side of the top edge is 39 Aurigae.
Processing was done in two parts. Star alignment using sigma-kappa stacking (sigma 1.15 @ 15 iterations) to remove the comet. Comet alignment using sigma-kappa stacking (sigma 1.15 @ 15 iterations) to remove the stars. Trailed star remnants removed using a FFT filter. Comet remants removed using psuedo flat procedure. Processed in Images Plus and Photoshop PS2 for colour balance and gradient removal etc etc. Isolated stars and comets images recombined using a single frame from middle of the stack as the realignment guide.
A full tutorial for this method is presented
here
Comments