October saw some great clear skies - part 2, the nebula edition

This edition is very nebula heavy.  Nebula are interesting in their aesthetics and beauty but are foreboding, inhospitable places.  In sharp contrast I love galaxies, they're tiny, life bearing universes unto themselves.  They are like turning up a rock and finding varied things of all kinds, rocks, bugs, worms.  Each galaxy too is unique, but i get ahead of myself thats post 3 of my wonderful start to fall deep sky observing!  Also be sure to check out part 1

IC 1848 the Soul Nebula

I had previously shot this area last year   One major difference that jumps out is the B&W vs false color from this year.  The color in all my newer nebula shots is false, created in photoshop where I turn the white areas of the nebula 'red' and the bright stars 'blue'.  The other things to notice are the duration of subs/total as well as the roundness resulting from better guiding, which is a combination of better guide cam and better overall polar alignment techniques.  Also the collimation was a bit better for this years attempt!


Second up is NCC 281 or the Pacman Nebula.

Here's a link to the 1920x1080 wallpaper edition!


Finally batting clean up for round 2 of my fall, clear and deep sky collection...

NGC 1499 the California Nebula.  I think this is the area around the San Francisco Bay area!  :)

Thanks for looking and be sure to check out all my Astronomy related images and follow me on Google Plus, Twitter or Facebook!

October saw some great clear skies -- Part 1

This month was full of many clear days.  I took advantage


First up is NGC 100, which according to http://cseligman.com/text/atlas/ngc1.htm has "a mere apparent size of 6.2 by 0.6 arcmins." It is also described as "exceptionally elongated galaxy, with a very small nucleus in comparison to its overall size. Such galaxies are sometimes called "superthin" galaxies." Nearby is PGC 1509358 a 17.9th mag galaxy.

Also in the lower left is UGC00219 a bright 15.5mag at a distance of 240,700,000 LY



Come poke around the full 1:1 resolution here


Next up is NGC 7814, another edge on galaxy. The one sports a nice dust lane and in contrast to the above galaxy, NGC100, this galaxy, NGC 7814 is a spiral. It "is sometimes referred to as "the little sombrero", a miniature version of Messier 104." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_7814) Edge on galaxies are very fun and the reddish orange core might be slightly exaggerated in this photo unintentially as I had a color balance issue.






Here's a link to the full 1:1 resolution

In the high res photo, the most astounding thing I've found to date is SDSSJ000302.45 or PGC3377433 in another catalog. At mag 20+ this tiny galaxy has a measured recessional velocity of 115421 km/s in converted distance it's 5.3 BLY away!!! WHAT?!!

Between the galaxy NGC7814 and the three bright starts to its right is the faint galaxy in question. Here's a closer look.

Labeled

Unlabeled

Blink Animation

Finally up a a face on galaxy and part of the Messier catalog, M74.  It's two main spiral arms make it a Grand design spiral galaxy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_design_spiral_galaxy ).

Full res here!!!



My full album of all galaxy photos - https://plus.google.com/photos/+MichaelAPhillips/albums/5825355202588613809?banner=pwa

All deep sky photos are here - http://maphilli14.webs.com/mike-s-deep-sky-photos

All photos are taken with my custom 14" f/4.5 Newtonian ()