NGC5128 (Centaurus A) by the Bunyip

[David Fitz-Henr]

Here is my effort for this galaxy; I had collected most of the colour data a couple of months ago and collected the remaining colour and luminance data last week. The night I collected the luminance was generally clear, but high cloud kept hazing over periodically; about half the luminance subs were good quality and the others were average, so I used the good quality subs for the detailed areas (with high s/n ratio) and used all luminance subs for the extended halo. In all I collected 5 hrs lum and about 3 hrs for each of R, G & B. Not quite up to Rolf's magnificent effort :eyepop: but I have managed to capture a lot of the extended halo as well as some good detail in the dust lanes. I believe that you can see a bluish trace of the nothern polar jet at about the 7 o'clock position from the core as well.

Large Image: http://www.pbase.com/image/150706962

[Larryp]

Superb, David :thumbsup:

[alpal]

Very nice indeed David,
I can see that you didn't have problems with noise in the low
s/n areas as the result is wonderfully smooth.
It's very well processed & it looks like you could
have even sharpened the brighter areas of the galaxy
to reveal a bit more detail - if you had wanted to.

cheers
Allan

[Peter Ward]

A very fine image indeed David. Expertly captured & processed.

Nice one :thumbsup::thumbsup:

[allan gould]

An excellent image that clearly shows the extent and form of this galaxy. I really like the processing you have done David, very clear and clean.
Allan

[marc4darkskies]

Beautiful David - lovely rich colour, trademark detail and great depth. :thumbsup:

Cheers, Marcus

[SkyViking]

That is really excellent David, good resolution and wonderful processing. And you definitely got a strong blue signal from the inner jet-related filament in the 7 o'clock position. Well done :)

[RickS]

Beautiful, David! And such a short exposure ;)

[strongmanmike]

Ah yes another Centaurus A, ya gotta love this galaxy huh? ;)

The dust lane looks good :thumbsup:

Mike

[gregbradley]

A beautiful image.

Greg.

[multiweb]

Terrific shot David. :thumbsup: You make it look so easy. :lol: Lots of interesting shaped galaxies in the background apart from the main subject which is superb. There's a really cool elongated one at 4 o'clock botton of the field.

[Paul Haese]

Very nice David. Stars are perfectly round, colours are nicely saturated but not overly done. I really like the background galaxy at the top right of the image. The jet is visible too and I really like the treatment of the dust lanes on the galaxy. Well done.

[madbadgalaxyman]

David,

Most impressive!

It seems to me that the distribution of blue+knotty material which is essentially the detected light from the OB stars (recently formed Hot & Young & Luminous stars) is very well shown at the scaling and color-balance that you have adopted.
A lot of the HII regions and blue stars are blocked by the dust lane, but you can see where some of the dust-obscured blue knots are, in your image;
it would seem that the distribution of the blue knotty material does not follow the dust lane in any easily understandable way.....

Sjastro (= steven) and myself, have been trying to figure out what is the three-dimensional structure of the warped spiral-galaxy-like structure that was acquired by NGC 5128 in a recent occurrence of the cannibalization of another galaxy by NGC 5128
(see sjastro's UV imaging thread about N5128 and my thread about N5128 in the science forum.)
Incidentally, there have been only a very small handful of scientific papers written about this topic; so ideas about the nature of the dust lane are always welcome!!

Cheers,
Madbadgalaxyman, alias Robert

[broca]

Well done!

[David Fitz-Henr]

Thanks Larry.


Thanks Allan; it's always a bit of a balance between showing detail and over-sharpening/contrast. I have though (just subtley) added a tiny bit more sharpening to the bright core and some of the background galaxies I had ignored.


Thanks Peter.


Thanks Allan.


Thanks Marcus.


Thanks Rolf.


Yeah :lol:, maybe next time I won't be so lazy!


Thanks Mike.


Thanks Greg.


Thanks Marc; I had partly neglected these background galaxies so I have slightly enhanced them now (sharpening and more detail stretched out) - the two near the bottom right corner and the one near the top right. I think my favourite is the one nearest the bottom right corner - now showing good detail in the spiral arms and nice red & blue hues.


Thanks Paul, appreciate the comments.


Thanks Robert; you always have some interesting analyses / comments!


Thanks Steve.

[RobF]

+1 :thumbsup:
Processed to perfection - so easy on the eye, and love picking out the background galaxies in your work now David :)

[alpal]

David


Looks great but there is not a comparison pic.
cheers
Allan

[LewisM]

Have to say, it is the best Cent A image I have yet seen.

[David Fitz-Henr]

Thanks Rob.


Yeah sorry, I overwrote the original but the changes were fairly minor anyway.


Thanks Lewis.

[Stevec35]

You're on a roll David! Another beautiful image.

Cheers

Steve

[Poita]

Jeez that is just lovely. Elegant and detailed.
I'm green with envy :)

[iceman]

Beautiful image David, really stunning!

[Ross G]

A beautiful photo David!

Amazing detail!

Amazing colour!

Great composition.

Ross.

[tilbrook@rbe.ne]

It's always a pleasure to view your images David!

Cheers,

Justin.

[David Fitz-Henr]

Thanks Steve; though rolling a bit more slowly lately with the weather, hoping for clearer skies over the course of winter!


Thanks Peter.


Thanks Mike.


Thanks Ross.


... and thanks Justin!