Unprocessed image of the giant asteroid Vesta

This is the first unprocessed image of the giant asteroid Vesta in front of a background of stars, obtained with NASA's Dawn spacecraft. It was obtained with Dawn's framing camera on 3 May 2011, from a distance of about 1.2 million kilometres. Vesta is seen in the centre of the image. The giant asteroid reflects so much sunlight that its size is dramatically exaggerated at this exposure.