M13 The Hercules Globular Star Cluster
Messier 13 or M13, aka NGC 6205 and is sometimes called the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules or the Hercules Globular Cluster.
M13 is a globular cluster with over 500,000 stars in a tight ball and is located 22, 180 light years from Earth in the constellation Hercules.
The sphere of stars is about 145 light years in diameter, it is estimated to be 11.66 billion years old.
It shines at magnitude 5.8….barely visible to the unaided eye as a fuzzy patch under dark skies. An easy target in Binoculars or small telescopes.
I often wonder if you were on a planet around a star inside that cluster, how many bright stars you would see in your night sky?
My Good Friend Ron Whitehead & another one of my Buddies from the UK David Ford turned me on to some new telescope/camera control software, so I thought i give it a whirl…
It took me about 30 minutes to figure it all out last night.
This was a quick test using that new automated capture software called “NINA” some of the Guys across the pond have been using it for a while…
its fairly straight forward and easy to use….and everything works seamlessly with PHD2 Guiding software via relays or Direct Guide and Plate Solves & works with many camera and Ascom drivers. My SKY X software does the same things on my MyT mount….but I Loved using “NINA”, it worked perfectly and on the first try, and will be great for some of my other mount setups I have. The Automated Flat Field Wizard was my favorite feature.
The Little Galaxy above the Hercules Cluster is IC-4617 shining at Magnitude 14.3.
I captured this image from my backyard observatory in Dayton on 05-31-2020.
C6 Newtonian telescope & QHY183M Cooled Cmos Camera, (Lum) for 51 minutes exposure on Bisque MyT Robotic EQ Tracking Mount.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
M106 Spiral Galaxy – Water Maser
Messier 106 or NGC 4258 is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici.
M106 is about 135,000 light years in diameter. The core of this 8.4 magnitude galaxy is fairly bright, but capturing the faint outer halo is a challenge from the city.
M106 is at a distance of about 22 to 25 million light-years away from Earth. M106 contains an active nucleus classified as a Type 2 Seyfert, and the presence of a central supermassive black hole has been demonstrated from radio-wavelength observations of the rotation of a disk of molecular gas orbiting within the inner light-year around the black hole.
M106 also has a water vapor mega-maser (the equivalent of a laser operating in microwave instead of visible light and on a galactic scale). NGC4248 is the little edge on Galaxy closest to M106. Many little background galaxies are visible as well.
I’ve been working on this one for at least the last 3 months, 10 nights for 16.4 hours of data, but had to toss out about half (8 hours) of the data, due to high passing clouds ruining many shots, from each of the nights data captures. I used my QHY183M Cooled Monochrome(Lum = 3 hours) & QHY183C Cooled Color(RGB = 5.4 hours) and Celestron C6 Newtonian reflector telescope, Baader Coma Corrector, Auto-guided with 60mm Guide scope/QHY5IIL mono camera, on a Bisque MyT Robotic Mount from my backyard in Dayton.
After going through all the images, I managed to assemble 8.4 hours of keepers, Captured & Calibration with the SKY X Camera Software, stacked in Deep Sky Stacker,
Aligned the separate nights images in Maxim DL, processed in Pixinsight, & Adobe CC2020.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
A Nice Solar Prominence on 05-25-2020
A Bight Supernova in Lenticular Galaxy NGC-3643
NGC-3643 Lenticular Galaxy with Supernova 2020 hvf, is a type Ia Supernova. Put this up full screen…its dead center.
Imagine the amount of energy that is being released by a star that went Supernova and now it outshines it’s parent galaxy that typically has a combined glow of 100 billion to 400 billion suns!
The star that went Supernova(12.8 mag.), actually out-shined the entire galaxy(14.8 mag.)…and has for the last two weeks now. The parent galaxy NGC-3643 is located 95 million light years away from Earth in the Southern part of the constellation Leo.
What I love about Supernova is, being able to see and capture these energetic events across the universe,.. Supernova are amazing, and without them exploding & seeding the Universe, we would have no heavy elements, no planets, no people or animals, no life as we know it!!!
I was lucky enough to have transparent skies in between sucker holes in the clouds last night…a lot of passing clouds, but got off enough shots for stacking. In the entire FOV there are over 60+ small faint PGC galaxies in the background…an entire cluster of galaxies much further away. Blow it up full screen to see them.
This is an 18 minute (Lum) exposure, with a QHY183M monochrome cooled Cmos Camera, bin 2×2, & C6 F5 Newtonian telescope, tracking on a Bisque MyT Robotic mount, from my backyard observatory in Dayton Ohio on 05/22/2020.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
IC-5146 The Cocoon Nebula
The Cocoon Nebula, (my nickname is the Brains)
IC 5146 is a reflection/emission nebula and Caldwell object that is 3200 light years away in the constellation Cygnus.
The Cocoon Nebula span about 30 light years across.
This is a 5 hour exposure with my C6 F5 Newtonian Telescope & QHY183M cooled Monochrome Cmos Camera, A bi-color Narrow Band Image HA + OIII image,
tracking on a Bisque MyT Robotic Mount. Captured on 10-02-2019 from my backyard observatory in Dayton, Ohio.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
M100 Spiral Galaxy and Friends
M100, Messier 100 (aka NGC 4321) is a grand design intermediate spiral galaxy located within the southern part of constellation Coma Berenices.
It is over 107,000 light years in diameter, and is located at 55 million light years from Earth.
As you can see M100 spiral has lots of galaxy friends nearby, and if you scan the background carefully you will see many more tiny galaxies as faint as 18th magnitude in this FOV. I have marked the brighter 15th- 16th mag.ones.
This is a 180 minute exposure with my C6 F5 Newtonian Telescope, coma Corrector, & QHY183M cooled Monochrome(LUM) & QHY183C Cooled Color(RGB) Cmos Cameras, tracking on a Bisque MyT robotic Mount, captured from my backyard in Dayton on 03-04-2020.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
M63 The Sunflower Spiral Galaxy
M63, Messier 63 or NGC-5055 “The Sunflower Galaxy” is a spiral galaxy in the northern constellation of Canes Venatici.
29.3 Million Light years away, its roughly 12 arc-min. x 7 arc-min. in size, and is part of the M51 group of galaxies.
I really like this galaxy as it has lots of subtle colors in the spiral arms as well as some dark dusty features visible in Front, as well as many tiny background galaxies visible too.
This is a 186 minute exposure with my C6 F5 Newtonian Telescope & QHY183M cooled Monochrome Cmos Camera(LUM) & QHY183C (RGB) Cooled Color Cmos Camera tracking on a Bisque MyT Robotic Telescope Mount from my backyard in Dayton, Ohio on 05-11-2020.
M97 The Owl Nebula – A Dying Star
Messier 97 (M97), also known as the Owl Nebula, is a well known planetary nebula (Dying Star) located in Ursa Major (Big Dipper) constellation.
The nebula lies at a distance of 2,030 light years from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 9.9.
It has the designation NGC-3587 in the New General Catalogue.
Messier 97 occupies an area 3.4 by 3.3 arc minutes in apparent size, which corresponds to a spatial diameter
of 1.82 light years. It was named the Owl Nebula because of its appearance in larger telescopes,
which reveal two dark patches that look like the eyes of an owl.
These were first sketched by William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse in 1848.
Our sun will meet a similar fate in about 6 billion years from now..
I captured this wider angle shot in the Narrow Band light of Hydrogen Alpha, Oxygen III, Oxygen III, mapped out RGB. Taken from my backyard
in the city of Dayton, Ohio on 05-06-2020. I used my C6 F5 Newtonian telescope, Baader Coma Corrector, Bisque MyT Robotic Mount, QHY183M Cooled monochrome
Cmos Camera, Bin 1×1, HA/03/03, 60 x 180 second exposures, 3 hours total exposure time. Captured in the Sky X camera/imaging capture software,
stacked in Deep Sky Stacker, aligned channels in Maxim DL, and final Processed in Pixinsight and Adobe CC2020.
M61 Spiral Galaxy with Supernova 2020 jfo
A Supernova in a Galaxy far far away..was discovered a few days ago…
Eight extra-galactic supernovae have so far been observed in M61,
making it one of the most productive galaxies for such cataclysmic events.
NGC4303 (M61) is a 10th magnitude Spiral Galaxy, now with another Supernova 2020 jfo
shining at 14.5 magnitude, located 52 million light years away in the constellation of Virgo.
Captured from my backyard in Dayton, Ohio with my QHY183M Cooled Mono Cmos Camera & C6 F5 (750mm) Newtonian telescope, Bisque MyT Robotic Mount, 66 minute exposure on 05-08-2020. Image scale is 0.47 arcsec/pixel.
I’m Grateful for my Dome for wind & cold protection..as it was very windy and cold
last night, but I got to image all night long despite the wind & strong Moonlight.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com
Solar Prominence activity on May 7th 2020
Its been a while since I had imaged the Sun..So..Yesterday late morning I captured several faint, but very Nice Groups of Proms around the Sun’s Limb….. I even watched a small Hellerman Bomb light up real bright then crash back down to the surface, that was a pleasant surprise….. I used my Lunt 60mm/50F Hydrogen Alpha Solar Telescope & QHY5IIIL290M camera, 1200 x 8ms exposures Stack in Registax6.
Captured from my backyard in Dayton, Ohio.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
www.galacticimages.com