2006 April 26, Comet Schwassmann-Wachmann

jakub · Post by **jakub** » Wed Apr 26, 2006 9:01 am

At first I was wondering what the RGB points on the pictures are. Then I realized that it is probabli a star which was in the field of view when the comet was photographed.

If I am right, than it is the same light source taken throught blue, green and red filter consecutively and severel such exposures put together. I know that this is a standard practice in astronomy photography, but it is nice to see it in action like this

orin stepanek · Post by **orin stepanek** » Wed Apr 26, 2006 12:38 pm

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap060426.html

There doesn't appear to be any reason known for it's being fragmented. Maybe it got clipped by an asteroid on one of it's approaches.

Orin

BMAONE23 · Post by **BMAONE23** » Wed Apr 26, 2006 2:05 pm

jakub,
The points are actually cometary fragments as the comet is breaking up. Look towards the constellation Cygnus around May 12

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Wed Apr 26, 2006 3:51 pm

Guys, jakub is asking about the RGB spots in the image, not about the cometary fragments!

He is right that these spots are images of stars resulting from sucessive exposures through red, green, and blue filters. Following the APOD links, you can see the same effect in images on this European Southern Observatory page. "As the telescope was tracking the comet, the stars appear as coloured trails, indicating the order in which the comet was observed in the different filters."

North is up and east is to the left in the pictures, so the stars moved from left to right between exposures, revealing the exposure order to be blue, green, red.