These pictures were taken in 2002, and were my first attempts at photographing a comet.
These pictures were taken in 2002, and were my first attempts at photographing a comet.
This shows the comet as seen on 12 March 2002. A passing plane narrowly missed hitting it - its navigation lights left a trail of dots. The camera is mounted on the tripod for my telescope, so that it rotates at the same speed as the Earth. My hedge is at the bottom right of the picture, and appears to be moving because it is.
In this shot, on the same evening, the planet Mars can be seen in the top left hand corner. Another plane managed to get in the picture. I rotated the image so that the wall of my garage is vertical, and lost the bottom right corner as a result.
Here the comet is seen through my telescope on 28 March. There was an element of beginner's luck involved; later photographs weren't so successful.
Lastly, this is the comet seen on 5 May 2002, nearer to Earth but fading rapidly.