Antennae and M83

[Martin Meredith]

Just in from the first session for months. I didn't have a lot of time: where I'm staying at the moment (in the south of Spain) the observing site gets the sprinkler treatment at 12.15 at which point its a rush saving all the kit from a soaking. And I didn't get set up until 11, so only time to have a quick look at a couple of objects, M83 (the Southern Pinwheel) and the Antennae galaxies, through high cloud. I took an SQM reading of 15.6 though with the moon its maybe a bit meaningless, but gives an idea of the high level of light pollution here.

Anyway, here's the captures. First, the Antennae (Arp 244) 75 mlys away in Corvus, which reach a healthy 34 degrees here:

I was well chuffed to have caught a hint of the tails in this murk and can't wait to get out to a darker site. No time to collect darks and I note that the sensor needs cleaning yet again...

And here's M83 on the Hydra/Centaurus border, at around 20 degrees above the horizon:

I could spend ages looking at these objects. More, I hope, later in the week...

Thanks for looking

Martin

[nytecam]

Excellent results Martin - both a bit iffy from latitude of UK :-)

[Paul81]

Awesome captures Martin - never observed either of these myself! 

[Martin Meredith]

Thanks for all the likes! I was out again last night under SQM 18 skies and managed to capture the tails a little better. This simply wouldn't be possible without the excellent live stacking in Lodestar Live, especially in alt-az mode and with a 76% moon just a few tens of degrees away, and streetlights within 30m. I used sum stacking and arcsinh compression.

The tails are actually longer than this -- I reckon I've caught about 50-60% of their length, so more to play for….

 (I also managed to make a mess of cleaning the sensor, but at least all the dust is now in one corner ;-) Must buy a dust blower.

Will post a few more southern objects later.

Martin

[Paul81]

You can definitely see the tails in that shot, I agree a great result considering the conditions!

They say a happy kid is a messy kid - a messy sensor is a well used sensor! Better dirty than pristine and left in the box!