Interesting question

[RT65CB-SWL]

One of my work colleagues today asked me if anyone (amateur or professional) attempted to photograph 'our' galaxy in whole, and if so, how is it done?

...also if there are any photo's too!

[barkis]

I'm afraid the only part of our galaxy that can be seen and imaged, are all the stars that you can see in the sky at any time of the year.

The Milky Way is a term used for the cloud like appearance seen in the night sky, which is caused by the sheer concentration of stars which form one of the spiral arms of our galaxy.

The Andromeda Great Spiral, which is a naked eye object, is very similar to what our own galaxy would look like, if we were on a planet within the Andromeda galaxy, and looking back at the Milky Way. Of course the Andromeda Galaxy, is way larger than ours.

Even if the Voyager spacecraft could look back at us, after travelling through space for many years now, wouldn't see us as a defined galaxy. The distance will need to be in the order of light years for a defined galactic shape to be seen.

Sorry, you can see a portion of our galactic home, but no where near all of it.

Ron.

[KevG]

Check out Nick Risingers monumental sky survey, an amazing piece of work;

Photopic Sky Survey

[ollypenrice]

We can, of course, only photograph it from the inside since it is about 100,000 lightyears across and 8,000 LY thick. Also the central part is particularly opaque and obscures what is, to us, the far side. Radio telescopes can 'see through' the disc far better, though, and can confirm that we live a spiral galaxy. The arms can be mapped at 21cm (radio) wavelengths.

Another famous whole Milky Way image is Axel Mellinger's.

Axel Mellinger's Milky Way Panorama 2.0

And for an incredibly beautiful image looking towards the crowded galactic centre there is this one by Stephane Guisard, an optical engineer in Chile. I'd describe this as the finest amateur astronomical photograph I've ever seen. Don't miss it...

Galactic Center Mosaic by Stphane Guisard/ESO, Los Cielos de Chile

A galaxy that is thought to resemble the Milky Way is IC342.

http://www.google.fr/imgres?q=ic+342&hl=fr&sa=X&rlz=1W1SNYK_en-GB&biw=1024&bih=491&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=DitrAY9yp2ZMPM:&imgrefurl=http://www.cidehom.com/apod.php%3F_date%3D080109&docid=zztP9Lbg1gHhLM&imgurl=http://apod.cidehom.com/pix/2008/080109.jpg&w=800&h=600&ei=Na9dT8-tEIqx0AWI14G-DQ&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=125&sig=106525504310967027902&page=1&tbnh=132&tbnw=159&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0&tx=78&ty=80

Olly