Easiest Current Galaxy To Find/View

[Lacertilian]

Hi all,
I have been reading up a fair bit on this forum, I really enjoy the [less than adequate amount of] time I have spent browsing.
I have recently bought a 12' Dob and got it collimated (as best I can manage), have had fun chasing down Saturn, Venus and of course the Moon but now that Saturn is getting lower each night I am looking to turn to some easy galaxies or DSOs.
Which ones are the easiest to locate in the sky at the moment?
I have stellarium and tried to find the Sculptor (NGC-253) but with no luck as I couldn't find it with my limited skill and I am not sure if it is because of light pollution or if I am just too much of a n00b.
Regardless, I am hoping to get something to look at which is easy to locate using a naked eye object as a reference point.
Thanks everyone! :)

[rustigsmed]

Hi Lacertillian,

Congrats on the new scope! 12" is great for visual :thumbsup:

Sounds like you've been star hopping already, galaxies can be hard to see if there is a lot of light pollution around - keep at it. NGC253 is pretty bright though so you might just need some more practise with star jumping and perhaps getting used to diverted vision (kind of like looking at the target out the corner of your eye) - they're not nicknamed 'faint fuzzies' for nothing :)

Btw, you can check out the Small and Large Magellanic clouds, you can spot these two dwarf galaxies with the naked eye in the south - check stellarium, and explore them, there you will find the impressive Tarantula Nebula amongst others in the LMC, and near the SMC you will spot the beautiful 47 Tucanae globular cluster. Its great viewing, also you should point toward the milky way centre and explore that before it sets - you can spot it by finding Scorpius.

An easy target is great orion nebula M42 in orion, aim for the middle handle of the saucepan but i think that rises a little later :thumbsup:

Good luck!
I'm sure others will chime in with other options.

Cheers

Rusty

[Allan_L]

Hi Lacertilian
Welcome to IIS :welcome:

Easiest galaxy for an unguided DOB would (IMO) by
Centaurus A or NGC 5128, a prominent galaxy in the constellation of Centaurus.

Star Hopping:
Start at the star alpha centauri (the pointer to the Southern cross).
Now move out to the bright globular cluster Omega Centaurus.
(Bright naked eye glob)
Now move the same amount in the same line and you will find the galaxy Centaurus A (aka The Hamburger).

Other DSO easy to find are TUC47 (on the edge of the small magellenic cloud)
and The Tarantula nebula (on the edge of the large Magellenic Cloud).

I am sure other will chime in with other favourites.

[mithrandir]

Alan and Rusty have some good suggestions. You might find "Tonight's Sky" (http://njstargazer.org/prog/prog.asp) helpful in tracking down potential targets.
NGC253 is about 7 deg south (i.e. in declination) of Diphda which is the brightest nearby object. Also NGC253 is about 1/6th of the way along a line from Diphda to Achernar, which line passes a bit to its east.

[omegacrux]

Hi and welcome
Tuc 47 is nice and easy looks good in big dobs
Another of my favorites is the jewel box right next to crux ( southern cross )

David

[JJDOBBER79]

What about M31 Andromeda galaxy. The galaxy itself should be naked eye in dark skies and easy through a scope even in semi-dark skies. Have to stay up a bit late though. Probably 10pm onwards. Not too hard to star hop from the square of pegasus.

[Suzy]

Hi Lacertillian,

If I can nab it with ease in my 10" thru light pollution, you will have no problem. It's very large & takes up a good chunk of space on my 10mm 65 degree widefield eyepiece. So I'm wondering.... are you observing it with the 10mm eyepiece that came with the scope? If you are, perhaps you're seeing thru it as the field of view of those plossls are quite small with high magnification such as the 10mm. I would suggest using the 25mm.

It is easily affected by the sky conditions. Sometimes I've seen it as a very thin faint streak and other times a nice long elongated oval.

Try going for NGC 55, also part of the Sculptor Group of galaxies; it's quite brightish, and of good size in the eyepiece.
Also, M77 is dead easy, sitting within a degree of delta Ceti. It's a pretty face on spiral with a very bright core. Depending on the seeing conditions will reveal more or less detail, so this is one of the galaxies truly worth re-visiting regularly IMO.

To locate NGC 253:

Use the brightest star in Cetus, Deneb Kaitos as your launch pad.
It is a yellow star.

To gauge the approx. location, make a fist held out at arms length with one eye closed- that's roughly 10 degrees- at Denebo Kaitos.
The galaxy sits 7 degrees away from Deneb Kaitos.

From Deneb Kaitos move the scope until you come to a group of 3 bright mag. 5 stars in the shape of a triangle. Keep moving slowly along that same line- the galaxy sits only about 2 degrees next to those stars.
The stars will be visible in the finder or binos.

Bearing in mind, if you have a newtonian, the image thru the scope will be different to that of the finder- upside down and inverted.

The attached star hop is for 9.30pm, 5th October.
149004

A useful forum thread to read: Easiest Galaxy To View? (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=58377)

And here (http://reference.wolfram.com/legacy/applications/astronomer/Atlas/BrightestGalaxies.html)is a link for the brightest galaxies to view.

A tip: Try and observe galaxies above 40 degrees. Below that, they tend to loose detail due to the murky lower atmosphere. The screen grab I've supplied above is at a nice 60 degree height- perfect. Zenith viewing with a dob is very difficult as you may have found out.

Another tip: Learn where the 26 brightest stars (http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/extra/brightest.html) are in our sky over the coming seasons. These are a good guide to finding objects and the constellations they belong to.

[noeyedeer]

i find it more fun chasing down globular clusters and open clusters, and getting familiar with the sky. galaxies are faint smudges (like globs) but least with higher powers you can resolve things in a globular.

I've tried for Neptune on countless occasions and have missed it (or seen it without knowing)... work constraints me, and my days off are usually cloudy :(

I think if you can nail the helix nebulae some brighter galixies might be visable, but if you can't nail the neb, you may be disappointed with what a galaxy may look like (until you can get to darker skies)

matt

[Lacertilian]

Wow, thanks for all the info everyone! That's awesome, now all I need is time and my neighbour's new outdoor area to have it's lights turned off once in a while!

[JJDOBBER79]

Hi all,
I was observing in a clearing in the middle of a cane field last night and I observed 3 galaxies (2 which were new to me) with my 6" dob. M31, NGC253 and NGC55. I wish I had have seen the directions to 253 on this thread before the weekend. haha. I was surprised to find 253 larger and more detailed than M31. As suzy was saying, M31 was quite low when I viewed it and the atmosphere gets in the way. I tried for M77 but as I was getting close dew set in. Maybe I will take advantage of the new moon and try again for M77 tonight.

[Suzy]

Hi Jas, yaaay I'm so happy that you nabbed those!
Welcome to the galaxy addiction :lol:.
I haven't observed NGC 253 thru my 10" at a dark site (yet! plan on it next new moon) and never got to see it thru my 6". But good grief, I got to see it thru a 16" at a dark site and wow it practically brought me to my knees! :eyepop: That's one galaxy on my to do list for a dark site. Did you see some mottling? Thru light pollution, all I see is a huge long grey cloud :lol: and sometimes its just a thin long faint thing.

I was observing M31 The Andromeda galaxy a couple of nights ago thru my 10x60 binoculars- it's an awesome object in binoculars (seeing conditions pending)! I then put my 4" on it, not that much different. I actually preferred the view thru the binos because it looked so prominent against a widefield.

Jase, I came across a post of yours asking about NGC 5102 and then I went to reply, got sidetracked and I don't know where that post is, so if you know, can you pls send me the link and I will reply?

Adding to some good suggestions already mentioned, here's some more which are ones that I've observed.


NGC 1291- Eridanus. Mag. 9.
This is a face on spiral ring galaxy. It has a really bright core and even from LP (light pollution) I can see the outer halo of that ring, truly awesome. It's one of my new favourite galaxies. :D It can take high power, so chuck on a 10mm ep.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_1291


NGC 1399 & 1404- Fornax (Part of the Fornax group of galaxies). Elliptical galaxies.
In a 65mm widefield 10mm (120x) eyepiece both these galaxies are in the same field of view. Fairly bright with 1399 being brighter. These are an easy catch in a 10" so I think it'll be well within reach of 6-8" scopes, esp. from a dark site. They're both smallish and round nebulous patches. It's always exciting (I think!) getting two galaxies side by side.

And speaking of pairs....
There's a pair of globular clusters that look a treat in Sagittarius. Grab this early while the constellation is still high-ish before it disappears below the horizon.
NGC 6522 & NGC 6588- The Twins.
Both are within the same field of view (with a widefield 10mm ep).


NGC 6397- ARA (again, grab this one early)
An impressive globular cluster.
My obs: It has a large condensed core (which I couldn't resolve, south of the core are many loose, easy to resolve stars and outer stars look scattered as if this GC has exploded! Bright. 10mm eyepiece used (120x).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_6752


NGC 6752- Pavo.
One of the prettiest globular clusters I've seen.
It's the third brightest GC in the sky after Omega Centauri & 47 Tuc.
My obs: Very bright, granulated core and bright stars sprayed out. Heavier concentration north of GC, south of GC are two trails of stars elongated south. 10mm eyepiece used (120x).
Ah, just reading the wikki link- no surprise it's nicknamed The Windmill if it refers to those trails I mentioned).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_6752


An eye popper star cluster.....
M11- The Wild Duck Cluster- Scutum.
There's a gazillion stars in that thing! :eyepop:
View this early in the session as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Duck_Cluster


NGC 7009- Aquarius (and don't forget Neptune while you're there).
The Saturn Nebula- planetary nebula.


Albiero- Cygnus. Grab this (http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://web.utah.edu/astro/pics/paul/albiero%2520352.jpg&imgrefurl=http://web.utah.edu/astro/starpage.html&h=265&w=352&sz=28&tbnid=3PBXp0F2Ze6uzM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=120&zoom=1&usg=__cgvBQ5xycsacb7qjvxYlPBwzuQE=&docid=lo8i02Rcu4tqiM&sa=X&ei=I9FSUrTYMYeYkQXznoGIBQ&ved=0CFMQ9QEwAw) first up earlier in the session before it disappears below the horizon. Point your scope at beta Cygni and you will see a fabulous contrasting pair of stars of yellow and blue. De-focus the focussr to reveal their colours more.


And here looks an interesting one for which I'm still to go after....
M29- Cygnus. Open cluster known as The Pants Cluster (or Cooling Tower). Apparently it resembles undies, oh this I have to see. :lol:
Its five hottest stars are all giants of the OB class- that's very hot and very big.


Lacertilian & Jase, that should keep you busy for a while. :P:lol:

[madbadgalaxyman]

(1) NGC 253 is not larger in the sky than M31. But in poor conditions you see only the brightest central parts of M31.

(2)
Yes, low altitude will make a galaxy much less distinct. I used to observe M31 from Darwin.....much better view than further south.

(3) That said, NGC 253 has a much higher surface brightness (brightness divided by area of sky) than M31, so NGC 253 always looks more "intense"


(4) M31 has a low content of gas and dust, compared to NGC 253. This means that there are no high-contrast dust lanes to see in M31. This makes M31 relatively unimpressive. This relative lack of dust and gas could even mean that M31 will soon cease forming stars!

(5) Recently, M31 has formed hardly any of the very luminous and very hot and very bright O & B stars that line the spiral arms in galaxies. The presence of many of these stars increases the surface brightness and the overall brightness of a galaxy. The absence of a prominent population of O and B stars makes the quiescent galaxy M31 seem rather low in intensity compared to NGC 253.

(5) Yes, M31 is bright, but that brightness is spread over an absolutely colossal area of sky!

(6) Because of its low surface brightness, seeing detail in M31 can be quite challenging. There is plenty of detail there, but it is at very low contrast, so it needs excellent sky conditions and persistence.
There is no very-well-defined detail to be seen within M31 because , as I said, it is gas poor and it has few OB stars and well-defined dust lanes.

(7) Objects of very low surface brightness are sometimes best seen at very low power. (but not always)

P.S.
NGC 5102 is a difficult object unless you have dark and transparent skies.
In poor conditions, you only see the central part of it and not the very faint extensions.

[AG Hybrid]

Sad to say. If you are attempting to chase down and find something deep and meaningful from Sydney's light polluted sky's your going to have a bad time.
The aforementioned galaxies from Sydney are nothing more then a hint of a shape. A region with a slightly lighter shade then the sky back ground. i.e. NGC253 is almost invisible in my 12".

However, on Sunday night in the blue mountains during our monthly meet, while chasing down galaxy clusters in the Mag 12-13 range I moved across to NGC 253 and other galaxies of that local group and it was a completely different object. A very large, bright and extended galaxy. Lots of contrasting details with the dust lanes. Mottled I believe is a correct term to describe it. A truly magnificent sight. But very disappointing from light polluted Sydney where I live. Almost pointless to look for in Sydney unless your testing your observing abilities to detect it.

I looked at M31 in a series of scopes as well. from 4" to 12". While it is very bright I found observing the companion dwarf galaxies more interesting to detect and observe. The view in the 4" was probably best. A large field of view to take it in is the most pleasing to me.

[Suzy]

Hi Robert,
I regularly observe NGC 5102 from my backyard thru light pollution.
Mind you, my view to the south is good as it faces awayfrom the city's glare.
It has a rectangular shape and on good nights I can see the long extensions come off a rectangular shaped core.
No other details within it tho, but, certainly, the shape is made out nicely.:D

I guess it depends on how much light pollution there is around, the seeing conditions (naturally) and if you're facing away from the city light glow.

[Wavytone]

Light pollution in Sydney is much worse than Brisbane, Suzy... probably a whole magnitude worse. Depends where you are of course, but by way of example the visual naked eye limit for stars at observatory hill is not much better than magnitude 1, and the light dome is huge, the radius exceeds 80km.

The need to work keeps me here, otherwise I'd have left long ago.

[JJDOBBER79]

Hi Robert,
wow, you know a lot about galaxies, thanks for the info.
Suzy, link is below. I'm interested in your opinion. And yes ngc253 was a long very faint thing only visible with averted vision. took up most of the FOV though. ngc55 was about half the field of view. I WAS in the middle of a cane field in the middle of nowhere. :D. I will have to take a look at some of the other targets you listed, maybe wont get a chance now until next new moon. Thanks for the info.

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=111574

[JJDOBBER79]

Thanks Suzy for this one. I like the "even in light pollution" part. I will try and hunt this down. I also had a crack at 3 galaxies in dorado on the weekend. Cant remember their names though. Dew was becoming a problem anyway as it was getting late. so im interested in tracking them down too. maybe not in reach of a 6"?

[Suzy]

Oh good grief- mag.1 ? :sadeyes:

I live 20 mins away from the city centre here in Brisbane and I have mag. 4.5 skies. I can just make out 47Tuc on many nights. I generally use it to gauge the seeing conditions for south. And Omega Centauri is easy to spot naked eye.

[Suzy]

I'm guessing they were the mag.10 galaxies in this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorado_Group) list :question:
There's a whole lot of galaxies in that group.:lol:
I haven't observed the galaxies there yet, I must get onto it in my next session- goody, I was looking for some objects to add to my list, so thanks! :D

You are doing awesome things with that 6" scope of yours Jas, good stuff. ;)
You will eventually find out the limit of what mag. galaxies to go for. I've found that thru my 10" scope, mag. 11 & 12 DSOs (deep sky objects) are too much of a stretch for me in light pollution. So I generally keep my list to under 11. Stars, not a problem as they're pin point light sources and the light is not stretched out over a large area like DSOs are.

Don't forget along with NGC 1291 to go for M77- I'm really curious to know how these perform in a 6". :D

Here's a link to a favourite site of mine. It's called the NGC/IC Project (http://www.ngcicproject.org/ngcicdb.asp)put together by one of the (& my!) most respected & seasoned observers, Steve Gotlieb (who is also a forum member here). On the home page, click on "Public NGC/IC Data Base" and type in what you want in the search box. It's a wealth of information for visual observers.

[JJDOBBER79]

thanks for the site suzy. I also tried M77 on the weekend from the same location. I tried for about half an hour but no luck. Most of that time was spend learning my way around cetus as I have never seen it before. I am keen to try again though. cant wait for next new moon. I have another good dark site here that only takes about 50min to get to and you can see the WHOLE ARC of the milky way. That is where I saw 5102 and centaurus A. and the southern pinwheel last new moon. I think I will go there again. sorry to rub it in to the city folk. :lol:

[chiaroscuro]

I've been following this thread closely - can't wait to get a chance to see some galaxies, although I'm not sure how successful I'll be with my 120mm refractor. I'm in dark skies though - got that going for me - but will need to use all those visual techniques to coax those dark fuzzies out of the night.

One thing though is that I've just bought an app called Observer Pro, which uses you location/time to give a list of DSO's visible by magnitude, name or constellation. I've used it to make a list for this weekend (skies permitting). Thought I'd mention it because it seems very useful so far. Wonder if others have found it helpful in their quest for seeing galaxies?

[JJDOBBER79]

I dont know of observer pro but I imagine it is very similar to skywalk (which I use) or the many others out there. I find it very handy in my process which is this.
1.) I use my (detailed enough) star charts which I downloaded and laminated from "eyes on the skies" to locate and mark on the chart what I want to find.
2.) I go somewhere dark and use skywalk on my iphone to find the constellation I want. I find this easier as I am still new to this and dont know many of the constellations yet by eye.
3.) I find the nearest star to the DSO and point my red dot finder at it. Then I use my right angle finder to star hop to where the DSO should be.

Sometimes I can see something fuzzie in the finder and sometimes I cant but even if I cant, this process should put me within 1 or 2 degrees of the target. then I just look through the scope and hover around a bit. If you dont already have a RDF, get one. I just mounted mine to my finderscope and have them both alinged together. They are about $40 and they make life easier because they have 0 magnification which is the easiest place to start, then you can use the magnification on the finder and, then of course the scope. So, effectively, you are starting from 0 and stepping up in magnification in increments while you hone in on the target.

I dont know much about refractors but its only a small step down in aperture from what I am using and I feel Im doing pretty well with mine. Maybe someone with a similar scope can tell you more. The most important piece of advice I can give if looking for galaxies is TAKE THAT SCOPE SOMEWHERE DARK. ie a camping spot in a national park. I often do this and dont camp. Just turn up for a couple of hours. A good rule is, if you can see a large arc of the milky way naked eye you will have a good chance. I would try andromeda at the moment but go late at night probably 2 or 3 am. It will be there from about 10am onwards but you will probably have the same trouble with the atmosphere as I did on the weekend if it is too low. Use your lowest eyepiece. good luck:thumbsup:

[chiaroscuro]

Hi Jas,
Thanks for the tips. I'm lucky that I've got a block of land 2 hrs south of Sydney, and there is a distant glow from Nowra to the south, but otherwise it's dàrk sky.
Do you mean a telrad for RDF? I've been seriously considering getting one to help with polar alignment too. Do you use a reticule too?

Sounds like you've had a lot of success with finding what you're looking for.
Luke

[JJDOBBER79]

Hi Luke,
I have no idea what a reticule is and I have never heard the term. To my knowledge a telrad is just a different version of a red dot finder which uses red rings instead of a dot. I cant comment much because I dont have or have never used one. All I can tell you is that when I got my RDF I wished my scope had come with one. I have only been "looking upwards" since may this year and so far I have observed 6 galaxies, 6 planets, several planetary nebula and many emission nebs. I guess I have had a lot of success but I am generally a bit of an obsessive person when it comes to hobbies. ie I tend to start a new hobby and get really passionate about it. (some would say obsessive:screwy:) None of the galaxies have been observed from my backyard and I live on the outskirts of a smallish town. Your block sounds like a good place to observe. Andromeda is usually in the north so light from the south shouldnt be too much of a problem.

[chiaroscuro]

My autocorrect got it wrong - its a reticle - an eyepiece with an illuminated grid to help measure and centre objects - http://www.bintel.com.au/Eyepieces-and-Barlows/Specialty-eyepieces/Orion-Illuminated-20mm-Centering-Eyepiece/159/productview.aspx

Anyway, I'll give Andromeda a go this weekend, although the horizon is a bit elevated to the north. I'll let you know if I have any luck with other galaxies.

I know how you feel about new hobbies - I'm pretty obsessed too.

Luke

[Archy]

3 easy galaxies:
Milky Way
Large Magellanic Cloud
Small Magellanic Cloud

[JJDOBBER79]

Hey Luke, just noticed in the classifieds, profiler is selling a rdf for $10 in Sydney.

[chiaroscuro]

Spent Friday and Saturday nights on a DSO quest. Best view of a galaxy (Besides SMC,LMC and MW!) was NGC10 -faint but extended across the FOV.
Great views of the orion nebula - mind-blowing, but Andromeda was too low for my position - a mountain was in the way.
I'm coming to learn that organising an observation list is pretty critical to a good nights observing.

[JJDOBBER79]

woohoo! Awesome. NGC10 is a mag12.5. You should have no problems with the other larger galaxies. You should try 253 next, same constellation. Should be a lot easier to see. I was just looking at the jupiters moons app and it is telling me that at about 4.30am on wednesday morning, Io and Europa will pass in front of jupiter. Should first see the shadows cast by the moons as they move across the face and then the moons themselves. apparently, this should be no problem in a 6" so i reckon you've got a shot at this too. 4.30am's no fun though. I have to get up for work at 5.30am anyway so I will give it a go.

[chiaroscuro]

:eyepop: 4.30 am:eyepop: Once you've pulled on the beanie and jumper, it gets easier! I stayed up till 3.30 on Friday to see Jupiter, and had a lot of atmosphere to look through, so I set the alarm for 5 am the following morning - better views once I cleared the sleep from my eyes. It was stripey, even.

Hope the clouds are kind to you. Great way to start the day!

[bkm2304]

I always whip the scope over to NGC 253 even if its fairly low. It's the top banana in the visual galaxy list. It's got it all- good dust, overlying stars, spirality, luminosity. And as an added bonus it fair fills the eyepiece. None of this dodgy smudge business!
Richard:thumbsup:

[GeoffW1]

Yes,

I got a good look 2 weeks ago at Sussex Inlet.

Cheers

[GeoffW1]

:rofl::rofl: That's on the list for the next viewing night at a High School

Cheers

[chiaroscuro]

Hey Jas,
How did things work out for you're early session this morning?

[JJDOBBER79]

Hi Luke. I had a big day so didn't get up in time. But I just noticed that it is happening again at 11.45pm on 18/10. (Friday night) that's a bit friendlier. I will definitely make that one. I will let you know. I should be able to see the shadows cast by the moons but I don't know about seeing the moons themselves.