Panorama

[Buzzard75]

I had begun taking pictures of the constellations during one of our club outings on November 3. The original plan was to build a catalogue that I could show to people at our meetings and events and they could use it to locate the constellations. That was before this contest even happened to come up. A bit fortuitous. Unfortunately, my framing was a bit off on some of my images and I ended up cutting off parts of some of the constellations without realizing it. Fortunately though, I had taken enough overlapping frames that I was able to piece this together in Photoshop. There are seven frames in total that have been stitched together. Each frame consists of 10x120s exposures in addition to darks, bias and flats using my Canon 750D with the Canon EF-S 18-55mm lens on my iOptron Skyguider Pro mount. The first image is just the starfield and the second I've lined out the constellations. You will find Aquarius, Aquila, Capricornus, Cygnus, Delphinus, Equuleus, Hercules, Lyra, Microscopium, Sagitta and Vulpecula. The head of Draco is also in there, I just didn't line it out as I didn't get the majority of the constellation. It may not be visible in the JPG's, but you can pick out other things like the Coathanger asterism, several Messier objects, Neptune, and even a couple of planetary nebulae, like the Blinking Planetary and the Saturn Nebula, if you know where to look. Also, that bright orange spot near Capricornus is in fact Mars. Enjoy!

[saac]

That is so cool, I like that

Jim