COMET HALE-BOPP ASTROPHOTOGRAPHY Last updated: 18 April 1997

Hale-Bopp 'til you drop! (4/18/97)

Eyepiece Projection using the Casio (3/14/97) Prime Focus using the Pentax (3/30/97)

On Saturday evening, 5 April, I participated in a field trip to Pyramid Lake, in the mountains north of Los Angeles, sponsored by Griffith Observatory and the Friends Of The Observatory (FOTO). The purpose of the trip was to observe Comet Hale-Bopp "'til you drop". There were FOTO and observatory staff on-hand during the bus drive to the observing site, and the observatory had set up several telescopes and binoculars at the site. There was even food and hot drinks. Overall the trip was well-planned and executed. The only thing that detracted from the trip was that for some reason the departure from the staging area in LA was delayed for 20 minutes. This meant that 150 people were denied an additional 20 minutes of observing and photographing time. And to make matters worse, clouds rolled in before Comet Hale-Bopp went behind the hills, which shortened the time even further. The flyer that FOTO sent out before the trip said that the departure would be promptly at 6:30pm, which only made sense since Hale-Bopp was low in the west and getting lower during the evening. I mention this only as advice to trip planners; stick to your scheduled departure times when viewing time is limited. Visually, Comet Hale-Bopp was stunning from this very dark site. Everyone on the trip enjoyed the experience thoroughly.

I now have the PhotoCD images back. The only ones that were acceptable were not taken with the ETX. Due to the clouds rolling in and some camera problems, all the ETX Prime Focus photos did not come out. But here are two photos I did manage to get.

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