M33 - Triangulum Galaxy sketch

[DarkerSky]

Nov 10 gave me a clear sky ahead of the advancing atlantic storm. Once the moon had set the sky was conducive to a bit of deep sky observing. I chose M33 as my target. After star hopping to its location I was initially disappointed with my view. All I could see at first was a small oval patch of grey light.

I swapped in a LPR filter to boost contrast. This helped enormously. The more I looked, the more I could see. I began to detect spiral arms spinning out above and below the central core and easily found the HII region - NGC 604 - on the galaxy's northern side.

By sweeping the galaxy across my FOV, I could detect the the full extent of what I could see visually from my light-affected location.

I also started to see a wealth of structure within the arms. The southern arm in particular gave me three distinct brighter areas that seem to puff out around the arm. I also got a third arm extending out eastwards. Several stars were seen in the FOV in and around the galaxy, but I didn't record them all...not yet!

Sketch in 16" x107 plus LPR (Lumicon) filter

TFOV: 0.63 degrees

LM 5.4

Transparency average

Decided to leave the sketch in its original pencil format to better show the detail captured. The HII region is near the terminus of the sprial arm at the bottom of the sketch, close to a star.

It's worth noting that what I could see is actually only the central area of the galaxy. Photographic images show the galaxy to be 2-3 times larger.

I also feel that visually there is more to be had on M33. I plan to go back to it and see what else I can pull out.

[oldfruit]

Nice sketch of what is a difficult target.

[Doc]

Fantastic, I'm lost for words.

[Bizibilder]

Lovely sketch - I have just tried imaging M33 and it is difficult to locate in either the finder or 80mm refractor - it is really faint and diffuse. Well done with the detail that you have pulled out.

[Ags]

I've seen M33 in my 100mm scope, but it was just a faint fingerprint, with the hint of another smudge nearby. You've managed to capture a lot of detail.

[Talitha]

What a fantastic observation, it reminds me of Lord Rosse's sketch. I was investigating M33 one night with the 7mm Axiom (261x, 18.8' fov) and found all sorts of bright knots in the arms... did you try kicking the power up?

[Venus_is_my_friend]

Great sketch!

I have found it once and it looked nothing like what you have captured, nice work.

[DarkerSky]

Thanks for the comments all. M33 is a difficult object. The detail I was seeing really was quite elusive, slipping in and out of averted vision. My techinque was to look for detail in the central core. As I did that more popped out just to the peripherals.

Carol - I did'nt up the power on this occassion. I was too enthraled with what I was seeing at low power. Next time I'll go higher though

[Andrew*]

Excellent sketch of a tricky object

[Talitha]

Seb, here's a good article about M33 which includes a link to a really nice pdf file. When the clouds and Moon are gone, it'll be fun to kick up the power and identify the bright knots in the galaxy.