Galaxy Hunting

[lux eterna]

With so little time left of this season, I pointed my Meade LX200-ACF to Coma Berenices so I would get as many galaxies as possible in one single frame. Used a Nikon D7000, HEQ5 Pro and NexGuide. Two nights gave a total of 6-7 hours of 10 minutes subs (1600mm F/7.8 iso200).

Ragnar

[vineyard]

That's an insanely rich field - they're like celestial fireflies!

[wimvb]

Great! So, how many galaxies did you catch in your net? 😉

[Pankaj]

I am blown away !! Awesome. Simply ''out of this world'' photo.

Where was this taken from....I mean the sky..what was the bortle rating?

[lux eterna]

Thank you @vineyard, @wimvb, @Pankaj.

How many, that is a relevant question. Something to think about when we are standing there under a sparkling night sky... It´s just like fireflies, right !

It is taken just 10 km from where I live. During these two nights the sky was SQM 21.45 resp 21.55 so between Bortle 2 - 3. The altitude of the subject was approx 59 degrees so pretty high in the sky, which helps a lot.

Ragnar

 

[wimvb]

2 hours ago, lux eterna said:

How many, that is a relevant question.

Simbad found some 3356 entries within your approximate field of view. In all fairness, some of these are stars, some are double entries, but most are galaxies, quasars, etc.

Here's what PixInsight's solver came up with

Eg, the one called PGC126753 (bottom edge) is some 2.5 Billion light years distant. Nice catch!

[lux eterna]

15 hours ago, wimvb said:

Simbad found some 3356 entries within your approximate field of view. In all fairness, some of these are stars, some are double entries, but most are galaxies, quasars, etc.

Here's what PixInsight's solver came up with

 

Eg, the one called PGC126753 (bottom edge) is some 2.5 Billion light years distant. Nice catch!

Let´s see now, if we add all the individual distances together... how many light years would we have present in that picture 😉

Ragnar

[Pankaj]

Most of the objects in the image are from the PGC Catalog. Is there a list of objects available on the internet where I can read about them?

[Martin Meredith]

8 minutes ago, Pankaj said:

Most of the objects in the image are from the PGC Catalog. Is there a list of objects available on the internet where I can read about them?

http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/ is the best source I've found

Martin

[wimvb]

1 hour ago, Martin Meredith said:

http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/ is the best source I've found

Martin

That's the one I use. It connects to Aladin, which is an online sky chart where you can click on any target and get information from Simbad.