Mike's Astro Photos

Here’s a photo I took from my observatory of Messier 51, the famous Whirlpool Galaxy.

M51 - The Whirlpool Galaxy - December 28th, 2011

At an estimated 23 million light years away, M51 is one of the most famous galaxies in the sky and a popular target for amateur astronomers. M51 is an interacting, grand-design, spiral galaxy. Interacting means, the galaxy is merging with another galaxy resulting in a disturbance of both galaxies because the gravitational fields of each are ‘interacting’ with each other. Grand-design is a designation for a special type of spiral galaxy that has prominent, well defined continuous spiral arms. Less than 10% of all spiral galaxies are designated grand-design.

Earlier this year in June 2011, a super nova was discovered inside M51 bringing renewed attention to the galaxy. I don’t think the supernova is still visible in last night’s image. I did look to see if it was there though.

Happy New Year!

Astro Photo Details
30 minutes RGB & 60 minutes of L / 150 total minutes (2.5 hours)
SBIG ST8300 Camera
MMOAG & SBIG 402 Guide Camera
Paramount ME Mount
RCOS 14.5
The Sky X / CCDStack / CCDSoft

Here’s a photo of the Galaxy NGC 891. This is the first image I have taken with my new system where all things were working perfectly: mount, scope, focusing, temperature & software. I am especially excited about figuring out the automation software because I literally slept through this job!

Astro Photo Details
30s of minute RGBL / 120 Total minutes
SBIG ST8300 Camera
MMOAG & SBIG 402 Guide Camera
Paramount ME Mount
RCOS 14.5
The Sky X / CCDStack / CCD Auto Pilot

I’ve been testing out a new scope the last month. I was finally able to get a pretty good shot out of it last night. Here’s a picture of the fantastic spiral galaxy, NGC 7331

Spiral Galaxy NGC 7331 - November 18th, 2011

NGC 7331 is 49 million light years away and approximately 30,000 light years across. It was discovered by Wilhelm Herschel in 1784 and is one of the brightest galaxies not cataloged by Messier.

Astro Photo Details
5×10 minute RGB / 150 Total minutes
SBIG ST8300 Camera
MMOAG & SBIG 402 Guide Camera
Paramount ME Mount
RCOS 14.5
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

Here’s my latest picture of the The Great Andromeda Galaxy. Also known as Messier 31, Andromeda is a spiral galaxy about 2.2 million light years away from Earth. In 964 a persian astronomer described the galaxy as a ‘small cloud’. When you look at Andromeda through a telescope, it looks like a smudge or a small cloud. Only with a camera and long exposure, does the galaxy’s true form take shape. The majestic spirals and bright center core reveal a universal grouping of over 1 trillion stars!

Andromeda Galaxy - August 23, 2011

Compare the astrophoto above with a picture of the Andromeda Galaxy from about 1 year ago, or this photo of Andromeda from 18 months ago. Skills, equipment and 1 year’s experience make a big difference in picture quality!

Astro Photo Details
5×10 minute RGB / 150 Total minutes
SBIG ST8300 Camera
Orion ST80 Guide Scope
SBIG 402 Guide Camera
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

I’ve started looking into remote observatories recently. These are telescopes in far off dark places usually with optimal seeing conditions. The telescopes and cameras are all 100% computer automated and you can buy time on the scopes and do whatever you want. Here’s what I was able to do on my first run using LB0002 at Light Buckets Observatory.

Sunflower Galaxy - March 13, 2011

Here’s a close up of the galaxy at full resolution:

Sunflower Galaxy - March 13, 2011

Image Details
LB-0002 Rodeo, NM
8″ Newtonian Astrograph
30x30x30 RGB 40xL
Processed with CCDStack & Photoshop Elements

Here’s my first attempt of photographing NGC 891, an edge-on spiral galaxy hidden about 30 million light years away in the constellation Andromeda.

I was surprised by how big the galaxy was especially since I was using a low powered telescope to view it. There are a couple of interesting things about this galaxy. 1) its edge-on which simply means what you think it means — we are looking directly at the edge or side of the galaxy. 2) Its an unbarred galaxy, which basically means there’s a big bulge in the middle of the galaxy. Since we are edge-on with the galaxy, we can see exactly how big that bulge is. These two factors working together along with the galaxy’s relative closeness and apparent size make NGC 891 a perfect astrophotography target.

During post processing, I had a few problems and some noise was introduced into the photo. I attribute this mostly to a bad set of flats. My flat field photo taking skills are one of the items on my short list for improvement. Problems aside, I’m still happy with the results and I will definitely be back to photograph this guy again.

NGC 891 - December 28th, 2010

Photo Details
William Optics FLT98 APO Refractor
Celestron CGEM Mount
Canon 20da DSLR Camera
1 hour exposure = 5 minute x 12 @ ISO 400

Approximately 3 million light years away in the constellation Triangulum is a spiral galaxy called The Triangulum Galaxy. Catalogued as Messier 33 or NGC 598,it is sometimes icalled the Pinwheel Galaxy, a nickname it shares with Messier 101. The Triangulum Galaxy is the third-largest member of the Local Group of galaxies, which includes the Milky Way Galaxy, the Andromeda Galaxy and about 30 other smaller galaxies.

M33 The Triangulum Galaxy - November 2nd, 2010

Photo Details:
William Optics FLT 98 / CGEM Mount
Canon 20Da Camera
SBIG STV Autoguider
12×5 minute ISO 400 exposures
Deep Sky Stacker
Photoshop cleanup

Here’s a recent photo of the Andromeda Galaxy taken with a William Optics FLT98. At a mere 2.2 million light years away, Andromeda is the closest spiral galaxy to Earth and visible as a fuzzy dot in binoculars or a small telescope. On a dark night you can see it with your naked eye or a basic camera lens. Andromeda is estimated to have over 1 trillion stars making it 2-3 times larger than the Milkyway.

Andromeda Galaxy - Sept 6th, 2010

Photo Details
William Optics FLT 98
Canon 20Da Camera
12×3 minute ISO 400
SBIG STV Auto Guider

Here’s a photo of the Sombrero Galaxy through the WOFLT98.

Sombrero Galaxy - May 5th, 2010

Here’s a crop at full resolution:

Sombrero Galaxy

I’m still getting the hang of this scope, but check out the difference in zoom and quality with the Sombrero picture take with the SCT.

Photo Details
William Optics FLT98
Canon 20Da DSLR
3 frames @ 2 minutes each
ISO800

Here’s a wide field shot of the galaxy  M88, one of 15 Messier galaxies in Virgo’s cluster of galaxies. Approximately 47 million miles away from Earth, M88 is a spiral galaxy with a highly elliptical orbit. This orbit will lead M88 to the core of the galaxy cluster in another 200-300 million years. There are several other galaxies visible in this picture, including M91 at the top center of the picture.

Messier 88 - April 14th, 2010

Here’s a crop of the galaxy at full resolution

Galaxy M88 - April 14th, 2010

Photo Details
William Optics FLT98 / Celestron CGEM Mount
Canon 20Da DSLR Camera
30 minute exposure 19×2 minute
ISO 800
STV Autoguider
No moon, clear

Here’s a wide field shot of M100, the galaxy in the center of the picture. There are several other galaxies in this picture. Can you see them?

Messier - 100

Here’s a picture of Bode’s Galaxy and the Cigar Galaxy. Some scientists believe these galaxies are close enough to each other that the gravity from M81 (the one of the left)  deformed its neighbor causing star formation to increase by 10 times. The galaxies look pretty close to each other but are actually separated by 130,000 light-years.

M81 & M82 - April 18th, 2010

Here’s a closeup of the galaxy pair.

M81 & M82 - April 18th, 2010

Here is a picture of Messier Object 63 a spectacular spiral galaxy nicknamed the Sun Flower Galaxy.

M63 - February 20th, 2010

Here’s a picture of Messier 84, a galaxy in the constellation Virgo. M84 is in the core of the Virgo Cluster of Galaxies, a part of the sky comprised of approximately 1300 galaxies… Wow. You can see what look to be at least 5 galaxies in this picture. Doing some quick math on this… over 5 billion stars are represented in this small piece of the sky imaged from a backyard telescope.

M84 - A Cluster of Galaxies

Here’s a picture of M82, an irregular galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major. Dubbed the cigar galaxy for its shape, M82 looks like its exploding. Astronomers explain this effect as gas being driven out of the galaxy by particle winds.

M82 Cigar Galaxy - February 13th, 2010

Check out this Hubble photo of M82 to experience the full effect.