After a little bear cub, a bear claw

[wimvb]

Last year I imaged a blue compact dwarf galaxy, the "Little Cub", named after its parent constellation Ursa Major.

Tonight I tried another blue compact dwarf glaxy, substantially larger than the Little Cub; the Bear Claw galaxy in the constellation Lynx.

Because the galaxies are strongest in blue (obviously), I started by collecting just that. I soon realised that this galaxy is just too small to make an interesting image. There is no larger companion galaxy, and an image would just be too boring.

The galaxy itself is quite interesting. According to images and scientific articles I found, it has a weak halo, ongoing star formation in H-alpha clouds, and even a possible tidal tail from an interaction event in its history. None of these were visible in my data.

So here it is, 1 hours worth of uncalibrated data (12 x 5 minutes), collected with the SW 190MN and ZWO ASI294MM

[ONIKKINEN]

In surveys there are a lot of galaxies in this field of view, and some visible in your image too. So it might turn out an interesting image if you dump (too many) hours into it and make it a kind of deep field snapshot. Probably not worth the time though with the weather how it is.

[wimvb]

@ONIKKINEN I thought of that. And some 20-40 hours of luminance might bring out the halo and maybe even a hint of the tidal stream. But as it looks now, we’d be happy to get half the time needed during all of galaxy season. I’m not sure I want to invest that time. There’s so much else out there waiting to be captured.

the problem is also that I had my camera at bin 1x1, and not the usual 2x2. I would need to recapture all data to get a complete image.

[ONIKKINEN]

47 minutes ago, wimvb said:

@ONIKKINEN I thought of that. And some 20-40 hours of luminance might bring out the halo and maybe even a hint of the tidal stream. But as it looks now, we’d be happy to get half the time needed during all of galaxy season. I’m not sure I want to invest that time. There’s so much else out there waiting to be captured.

the problem is also that I had my camera at bin 1x1, and not the usual 2x2. I would need to recapture all data to get a complete image.

Oh i get it, my galaxy season target list will last me at least the next 3 years of galaxy season 😅. Too much out there this time of year and so little time!

[Dan_Paris]

Good capture well done ! I like this FOV with the two galaxies (Bear's claw and Needle) so different form each other

 

clear skies,

 

Dan