C 2022 E3 (ZFT) is a long period comet from the Oort cloud that was discovered by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) on March 2, 2022.  The comet has a bright green glow around its nucleus, because of sunlight on diatomic carbon and cyanogen.  The comet’s systematic designation starts with C to indicate that if is not a periodic comet, and “2022 E3” means that it was the third comet to be discovered in the first half of March 2022.  The closest approach to earth was on February 1, 2023.  I captured the image on January 28, 2023, from my backyard.  The orbital period is about 50,000 years, with its return to earth in February of 52023.

Equipment used:

Explore Scientific 102mm f/7 FCD100 Triplet Carbon Fiber Refractor telescope with a .7 reducer

Svbony 60mm guide scope and ZWO ASI120MM-S camera

ZWO ASI924MC Pro dedicated astrophotography camera

ZWO Electronic Automatic Focuser

ZWO ASIAIR Plus computer

Optolong UV/IR Cut filter

Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro mount with Rowan belt modification

Imaging data:

Lights:  100 x 2-minute exposures

Darks:  50 x 2 minutes exposures

Flats and Dark Flats:  100 exposures

Processing software:

Pixinsight