This composite image of Comet Hale-Bopp was made by cutting and pasting 
six different images of Hale-Bopp taken on the evening of April 2, 1997.  
This procedure permits a large area of the sky to be imaged using a 
telescope and camera that normally cover a much smaller area.  The 
result is a larger image with higher resolution than can be obtained in 
a single photograph.  The only side effect of this procedure is that it 
is impossible to completely eliminate the seams between the individual 
images.  (Seams are also visible in images taken by the Hubble Space 
Telescope!) 

All six individual images (and thus the complete composite image) have 
been logarithmically scaled by replacing each picture value with its 
corresponding logarithm.  Log scaling tends to compress the brightness 
range of an image, allowing one to view both bright areas (such as the 
comet's head) and dim areas (such as the tail) at the same time.

The 32kb image is actually a half resolution image obtained by scaling 
the original image down by 50%.  This results in a smaller image file 
and the image is better suited for viewing on a 640 x 480 x 256 color 
video driver.  The original 113kb image is best viewed on a 1024 x 768 x 
256 color video driver.  Check your windows manual or windows help file 
for information on how to change video drivers. 

Object: Comet Hale-Bopp
Date:  Evening, April 2, 1997
Telescope focal length: 500mm
Telescope aperture: 80mm
Camera: Santa Barbara Instruments ST-6
Exposure: 5s for each of the six individual exposures.
Observer(s): Greg and Teddy Latta
Processed by: Greg Latta