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Summer Milky Way & Comet G3 at The Pinnacles Desert, Western Australia

Nikon d810a

50mm

ISO 6400

f/2.8

Foreground: 26 x 25 seconds

Sky: 72 x 20 seconds

H-Alpha: 9 x 60 seconds

iOptron SkyTracker

 

This is a 107 shot panorama of the summer Milky Way arch and Comet G3 (ATLAS) above The Pinnacles Desert, 2 hours north of Perth in Western Australia.

 

As the comet was rapidly setting, I started with a six image stack of that then proceeded to take the rest of the panorama as I normally do, combining the images later using MS ICE. I had initially planned on using

an 85mm lens but soon realised that it would take far too long and the summer band of the Milky Way would be well past zenith by the time I had finished, which is not ideal for a number of reasons. Still quite happy

with the way this turned out.

 

Comet G3 is just above the horizon on the far right, its tail was quite huge spanning around 15 degrees. The Southern Hemisphere summer arch is to the left with hydrogen alpha regions highlighted in red, captured using a special filter. Inbetween the arch and comet are the Large & Small Magellanic Clouds.

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Uploaded on March 9, 2025
Taken on February 1, 2025