Comet Hale-Bopp

Pictures taken before March 1, 1997


Full picture - 53 K gif

David Renneke, Cecilia Vogel and Marsha Smith
Milan, Illinois
February 25, 1997

This is the central part of a picture taken at 5:36 am CST (about 1 hour before sunrise) at a rural Milan site using a Meade 8" telescope and an SBIG ST-6 CCD camera. This was a 0.5 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The moon was three days past full and was shining brightly in the southwest. The comet was very easy to see with the naked eye. In 7x50 binoculars the dust tail was very prominent, extending upward and to the right. The comet was a distance of 1.54 AU from Earth and 1.10 AU from the Sun. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken. All of us who participated in taking this picture are faculty members at Augustana College.

Full picture - 75 K gif

David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
February 13, 1997

This is the central part of a picture taken at 6:06 am CST (about 1 hour before sunrise) at the same location and using the same equipment as the picture of February 25 shown above. This was a 1 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. Comparing this to the 2-second photo of January 21 (below), it is clear that the comet has gotten much brighter. It was very easy to see with the naked eye. The comet was a distance of 1.75 AU from Earth and 1.22 AU from the Sun. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken.

Full picture - 69 K gif

David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
January 21, 1997

This is the central part of a picture taken at 6:18 am CST at the same location and using the same equipment as the picture of July 12 shown below. This was a 2 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The comet was a distance of 2.47 AU from Earth and 1.88 AU from the Sun. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken.

Full picture - 72 K gif

David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
October 14, 1996

This is the central part of a picture taken at 8:35 pm CDT at the same location and using the same equipment as the picture of February 25 shown above. This was a 10 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The comet was a distance of 3.03 AU from Earth. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken. Note the further evident of jets!

Full picture - 84 K gif

Cecilia Vogel and David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
October 5, 1996

This picture was taken from a rural site at 9:27 pm CDT using a Meade 8" telescope and an SBIG ST-6 CCD camera. This was a 10 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The comet was a distance of 3.01 AU from Earth. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken.

Full picture - 91 K gif

David Renneke and Jeff Strasser - Milan, Illinois
September 28, 1996

This is the central part of a picture taken at 9:36 pm CDT at the same location and using the same equipment as the picture of February 25 shown above. This was a 10 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The comet was a distance of 2.97 AU from Earth. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken. The moon was shining brightly being two days past full. The picture shows several jets. These jets were observed on September 16 by Gordon Garradd. Another picture of these jets was taken by N. Thomas and put on the Web on November 13, 1996.

Full picture - 79 K gif

David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
August 12, 1996

This is the central part of a picture taken at 10:16 pm CDT at the same location and using the same equipment as the picture of February 25 shown above. This was a 10 second exposure. The size of the photo is 14' x 9'. The comet was a distance of 2.75 AU from Earth. Click on full to see the entire 28' x 18' picture that was taken. The streak shown just above the comet is a meteor from the Perseid meteor shower!

Full picture - 84 K gif

David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
August 12, 1996

This picture was taken at 11:16 pm - exactly one hour after the above picture was taken. It is framed with the same star field to make the comet movement more evident. The brightest star in this picture has a magnitude of only 13.1 based on information from the Hubble Guide Star Catalog CD.

77 K gif

Cecilia Vogel and David Renneke - Milan, Illinois
July 12, 1996

This picture was taken from a rural site at 12:27 am CDT using a Meade 8" telescope and an SBIG ST-6 CCD camera. This was a 10 second exposure. The size of the full photo is 28' x 18'. The comet was a distance of 2.81 AU from Earth.

[July 5 - movie]

David Renneke - Rock Island, Illinois
July 5, 1996

If you have a browser that shows animated GIF files, you are watching one hour of a time-lapse movie of Comet Hale-Bopp. It starts at 4:45 Universal Time. Each frame was a 5 second exposure using an SBIG ST-6 CCD camera on the Celestron C-14 telescope in Augustana College's campus observatory. The size of the frame is 6' x 4'. The comet was at opposition a distance of 2.87 AU from Earth and 3.87 AU from the Sun.
[June 25 - CCD picture] 67 K gif

David Renneke - Rock Island, Illinois
June 25, 1996

This picture was taken at 12:20 am CDT using an SBIG ST-6 CCD camera on the Celestron C14 telescope in Augustana College's campus observatory. This was a 20 second exposure. The size of the full photo is 11' x 7'.
Last update: March 16, 1997