Blog - Galactic Images

The Thin Waxing Crescent Moon / Earthshine

By John Chumack|2021-04-22T00:50:37+00:00April 22nd, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #thinCrescent, #Universetoday, #Waxingmoon, Astronomy, Earthshine, Moon, Space|

The Thin Waxing Crescent Moon just before setting behind some trees in the west from last Wednesday night 04-14-2021.

The sky was still in twilight…but I snapped these shots before it hit the treeline.

Both of these images were taken through my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope and QHY183C cooled Cmos Camera.

The thin crescent moon image was a 10ms Exposure, properly exposed to show craters details,

and the Earthshine shot was a 3 second exposure, purposely overexposed sunlit side, to show the darker reflected Earth lit side of the Moon(Earthshine).

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

NGC3718 The Ornament Galaxy

By John Chumack|2021-04-17T16:59:25+00:00April 17th, 2021|Tags: #Arp214, #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #galaxy, #Hickson56, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #NGC3718, #NGC3729, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, #ursamajor, Astronomy, Galaxies, Space|

NGC3718 The Ornament Galaxy!!!

Also known as Arp 214, is a galaxy located approximately 52 million light years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major.(The Big Dipper Region)
The Galaxy contains an Active Galactic Nucleus(AGN) which may contain a massive black hole.
NGC3718 is either a Lenticular or spiral galaxy. NGC 3718 has a warped, s-shape, and it reminds me of a Christmas tree ornament, hence my nickname for it.

NGC3718 Lenticular Galaxy shines at magnitude 10.6 & NGC3729 Spiral(left) shines at magnitude 11.2

Directly below the ornament Galaxy in this image is a Compact Galaxy Group known as Hickson 56 and is even further away at 425 million light years distance, Not bad for a capture with a 4 inch diameter scope!

Captured with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount,
QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, two nights 04-02-2021 & 04-14-2021 before clouds rolled in.
200 min exposure, (40 x 300sec subs), SKyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

M88 Spiral Galaxy

By John Chumack|2021-04-15T10:45:01+00:00April 15th, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #ComaBerenices, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #M88, #messier88, #natgeo, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, #virgocluster, Astronomy, Space|

Messier 88 (also known as M88 or NGC 4501) is a spiral galaxy about 50 to 60 million light-years away from Earth in the

constellation Coma Berenices. It was discovered by Charles Messier in 1781.

M88 is one of the fifteen Messier objects that belong to the nearby Virgo Cluster of galaxies.

It is galaxy number 1401 in the Virgo Cluster Catalogue (VCC) of 2096 galaxies that are candidate members of the cluster.

This galaxy is inclined to the line of sight by 64°. It is classified as an Sbc spiral, a status between

Sb (medium-wound) and Sc (loosely wound) spiral arms.

The spiral arms are very regular and can be followed down to the galactic core.

Captured on 04-01-2021 with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, 180min exposure, (36 x 300sec subs), SkyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

NGC-4244 The Silver Needle Galaxy

By John Chumack|2021-04-12T12:32:19+00:00April 12th, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #NGC4244, #QHYCCD, #silverneedlegalaxy, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, Astronomy, Galaxies, Space|

NGC 4244 Galaxy, also known as Caldwell 26 or The Silver Needle Galaxy is an edge-on loose spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici, and is part of the M94 Group or Canes Venatici I Group, a galaxy group relatively close to the Local Group containing the Milky Way.

Visually it appears around 10th magnitude, and is a long thin(17 arc min x 7 arc min) needle like galaxy! I never had noticed the small dark dust lane near the stellar looking core before, but the dark dust lane is visible in this sharp image.

NGC 4244 is located about 14.1 Million light years away.

The bright 6.73 magnitude star at the right edge of this image is HIP 60161.

Captured on 04-01-2021 with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, 150min exposure, (30 x 300sec subs), SkyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

M20 The Trifid Nebula Complex in Sagittarius

By John Chumack|2021-04-08T10:57:57+00:00April 7th, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #nebula, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Trifid, #trifidnebula, #Universetoday, Astronomy, Sagittarius, Space|

M20 The Trifid Nebula in Sagittarius
The Trifid Nebula (catalogued as Messier 20 or M20 and as NGC 6514) is an H II region in the north-west of Sagittarius in a star-forming region.
The Trifid is divided into three lobes of red Emission nebula, also it has a blue reflection nebula at the top, and the dark nebula are what divides the 3 red lobes. This is a fantastic combination of Emission, reflection & dark nebula along with the associated star cluster.
It was discovered by Charles Messier on June 5, 1764.

This beautiful Nebula is 4,100 light years from Earth, and spans 42 light years across.

Captured on 03-20-2021 with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, 80min total exposure, (16 x 300sec subs), SkyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

Nova in Cassiopeia – V1405 Cas

By John Chumack|2021-04-04T23:41:17+00:00April 4th, 2021|Tags: #Cassiopeia, #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #nova, #novaV1405Cas, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, #V1405Cas, Astronomy, Space|

The New Nova Cas 2021 (V1405 Cas)

A new nova in Cassiopeia was discovered on March 18th, is bright enough to see in a small telescope or binoculars.
Nova Cassiopeia 2021, designated V1405 Cas, shone around magnitude 8 on March 21, 2021. It’s located in a star rich region of western Cassiopeia.

Yuji Nakamura of Japan discovered the object at magnitude 9.6 in four images he took with a 135-mm lens on March 18th.
Four days prior, nothing was visible at the location down to magnitude 13.
Within a day, Nova Cassiopeia 2021 received its permanent designation, V1405 Cas.

The new object (V1405) Cas is located at right ascension 23h 24m 48s, declination +61° 11′ 15″.
The New Nova is 0.5 degrees south of the bright open cluster M52, and 0.5 degrees east of the Bubble Nebula (NGC 7635)(seen on the right edge).

I finally was able to see and capture it for myself and by the time I got my first photo 04-02-2021, the New Nova had risen to magnitude 7.9, and was easily bright enough to see in my 10 x 70mm binoculars.

The nova is circumpolar for mid-northern latitudes and observable all night, but it’s best seen during the early evening and just before dawn, I had only 30 minutes to shoot it once it cleared the trees, just before dawn came up and washed out the night sky.

The new object (V1405) Cas is located at right ascension 23h 24m 48s, declination +61° 11′ 15″. The New Nova is 0.5 degrees south of the bright open cluster M52, and 0.5 degrees east of the Bubble Nebula (NGC 7635).

Classical novae like V1405 Cas are close binary stars comprised of a compact white dwarf and either a main-sequence star like our Sun or a red giant. The dwarf’s powerful gravity siphons hydrogen from its partner into an accretion disk. Material then funnels from the disk to the dwarf’s surface, where it’s compacted and heated to around 10 million Kelvin, hot enough to trigger explosive nuclear fusion.

102mm Explore Scientific Triplet APO refractor, Bisque ME mount & QHY183C Cooled Cmos color camera. 30 minute exposure.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

NGC4725 The One Armed Barred Spiral Galaxy

By John Chumack|2021-04-02T21:29:27+00:00April 2nd, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #ComaBerenices, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #NGC4712, #NGC4725, #NGC4747, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, Astronomy, Astrophotography, Galaxies, Space|

NGC 4725 is an intermediate barred spiral galaxy with a prominent ring structure, located in the northern constellation of Coma Berenices near the north galactic pole. It was discovered by German-born astronomer William Herschel on April 6, 1785. NGC 4725 is over 100 thousand light-years across and lies 41 million light-years away from the Milky Way.

NGC 4725 at Magnitude 10.1 is the brightest member of the Coma I Group of the Coma-Sculptor Cloud, although it is relatively isolated from the other members of this group. This galaxy is strongly disturbed and is interacting with neighboring spiral galaxy NGC 4747(upper left), with its spiral arms showing indications of warping. The pair have an angular separation of 24′, which corresponds to a projected linear separation of 370 kly. A tidal plume extends off the screen from NGC 4747, but also toward NGC 4725. The galaxy to the right of NGC4725 is 12.5 magnitude spiral galaxy NGC4712.

This is a suspected type 2 Seyfert galaxy with a supermassive black hole at the core. The morphological classification of this galaxy is SAB(r)ab pec, indicating a peculiar, weakly-barred spiral galaxy (SAB) with a complete ring surrounding the bar (r) and somewhat tightly-wound spiral arms (ab). It is actually double-barred, a feature found among about a third of all barred spirals. The galactic plane is inclined by approximately 46° to the line of sight from the Earth.

The ring structure of the galaxy is a region of star formation. It is offset from the galactic center and displays non-circular motion. There is a compact radio source positioned approximately 6,200 ly from the nucleus of NGC 4725. Since there is no optical counterpart at that position, this may be a star forming region that is heavily obscured by dust.

There are many smaller background galaxies visible in my image as well.

Captured on 03-19-2021 with my

Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera,

90 min exposure, (18 x 300sec subs), Darks, Flats, Lights captured with SKyX Camera software, guided with PHD2, stacking with DSS, Final processing Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

M61 Barred Spiral Galaxy in Virgo

By John Chumack|2021-04-01T11:41:59+00:00April 1st, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #m61, #natgeo, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #space #astronomy, #spiralgalaxy #galaxy, #Universetoday, #virgocluster, Virgo|

M61 Barred Spiral Galaxy
Messier 61 (also known as M61 or NGC 4303) is an intermediate barred spiral galaxy in the Virgo Cluster of galaxies. It was first discovered by Barnaba Oriani on May 5, 1779, six days before Charles Messier discovered the same galaxy. Messier had observed it on the same night as Oriani but had mistaken it for a comet.

M61 is one of the largest members of Virgo Cluster, and belongs to a smaller subgroup known as the S Cloud. Eight extra-galactic supernovae have so far been observed in M61, making it one of the most productive galaxies for such cataclysmic events, with the last supernova occurring in 2020.(SN2020jfo). Here is a link to my image of the last Supernova that appeared in this galaxy in 2020. https://www.galacticimages.com/m61-spiral-galaxy-with-supernova-2020-jfo/

Captured on 03-19-2021 with my
Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, 120min exposure, (24 x 300sec subs), SkyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

NGC4302 and NGC4298 – A Pair of Spiral Galaxies

By John Chumack|2021-03-31T11:56:56+00:00March 31st, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #ComaBerenices, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #natgeo, #NGC4298, #NGC4302, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, Astronomy, Galaxies, Space|

It takes two to Tango…

This Pair of Galaxies NGC4302 & NGC4298 shine at 12.7 & 11.4 magnitude.

The edge-on galaxy is called NGC 4302, and the tilted galaxy is NGC 4298. These galaxies look quite different because

we see them angled at different positions on the sky. From our view on Earth, researchers report an inclination of 90 degrees

for NGC 4302, which is exactly edge on. NGC 4298(right) is tilted 70 degrees.

They are actually very similar in terms of their structure and contents.

Both galaxies are approximately 55 million light-years away. They reside in the constellation Coma Berenices and both were discovered in 1784 by astronomer William Herschel.

The edge-on NGC 4302 is about 87,000 light-years in diameter, which is about 60 percent the size of the Milky Way.

It is about 110 billion solar masses, approximately one-tenth of the Milky Way’s mass.

The tilted NGC 4298 is about 45,000 light-years in diameter, about one third the size of the Milky Way.

At 17 billion solar masses, it is less than 2 percent of the Milky Way galaxy’s 1 trillion solar masses.

There are many fainter background galaxies visible as well.

I captured this with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO refractor, Bisque ME Mount, And QHY183C Cooled Color Cmos Camera, 275 minutes of integrations time(55 x 300sec subs) 4 hours & 35 mins of exposure over two nights 03-06-2021 & 03-20-2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com

M99 Spiral Galaxy

By John Chumack|2021-03-30T11:18:57+00:00March 30th, 2021|Tags: #ChumackObservatories, #ComaBerenices, #GalacticImages, #JohnChumack, #M99, #messier99, #natgeo, #QHYCCD, #skyatnight, #Universetoday, Astronomy, Galaxies, Space|

All this week I will be posting Galaxies shot with a small 102mm scope…. Since Spring time is galaxy season, first up is :

M99 Spiral Galaxy in Coma Berenices

Messier 99 or M99, also known as NGC 4254, is a grand design spiral galaxy in the northern constellation Coma Berenices approximately 15,000,000 parsecs (49 million light-years) from the Milky Way.

It was discovered by Pierre Méchain on 17 March 1781. The discovery was then reported to Charles Messier, who included the object in the Messier Catalogue of comet-like objects becoming the 99th member of the list.

It was one of the first galaxies in which a spiral pattern was seen. This pattern was first identified by Lord Rosse in the spring of 1846.

Visually it is 10.4 magnitude, and its apparent size is 5.4 x 4.7 arc minutes. Yes, there are several other smaller background galaxies visible in the image as well.

Captured on 03-19-2021 with my Explore Scientific 102mm Triplet APO Refractor telescope, Bisque ME Mount, QHY 183C Cooled Cmos Camera, 120min exposure, (24 x 300sec subs), SkyX Camera capture software, PHD2, DSS, Pixinsight, & Adobe CS 2021.

Best Regards,

John Chumack

www.galacticimages.com