October Imaging Challenge

[PhotonCollector]

For this month's DEEP SKY CHALLENGE

I nominate NGC 1097, a barred spiral galaxy, in the southern constellation of Fornax.

clear skies!
Paul M

[Ric]

Great choice Paul, at mag 9.3 it should be a lot of fun and a good challenge.

cheers

[Striker]

Sounds good Paul...too bad I wont be doing any imaging for a while.

[Ric]

I just been checking which way it will be rising and have found that it be totally obscured by my neighbours garage and then by a tree. I've been rulled out before I even started.
Oh well, I'll just enjoy everyone elses images and hopefully be back for the November challenge.

Happy imaging everyone

[tornado33]

For me at Newcastle, Star Atlas Pro indicates it transits at 1:39 am now, so once the moon is gone I will give it a good go. For me its anything north of dec. 0 thats a problem
Scott

[PhotonCollector]

Hi all,

Glad it is a good target for most of you. NGC has a companion galaxy catalogued as NGC1097A, which we'll see in the forthcoming participants pics.

I learn't recently that NGC 1097 apparently has 4 jets which shoot from the core of this galaxy, not sure if any of us could image the jets???

Clear skies
Paul

[Striker]

I would definetly be giving it a go Paul but I think I need a camera first...hehehe

look forward to seeing some images of this one..I havn't imaged it before.

[Ric]

I have been rechecking 1097's positions in my trusty Star Atlas Pro and I now may get a chance at it later in the month. :cool:
I will watching it's movements with anticipation :astron:
and hopefully bag an image.


cheers all

:camera:

[EzyStyles]

here's my effort from last night . 12 x 4 minutes at iso 800. no shooting jets from the core unfortunately but NGC1097A is situated top left of the galaxy.

[Garyh]

You beat me to it Eric, good job ...:thumbsup:
I had a go last night too before the moon came up.
Its hard to bring detail out from a small faint galaxy but heres my go..
7 frames at 1600 iso - 4mins each eith darks removed all the rest in PS..
6" reflector at f/5.6.
Cheers Gary

[Lee]

Eric/Gary - nice shots - now I'll know what to look for when I have a crack at it with my imaging newt.....

[strongmanmike]

I managed to get out last night and image the October Imaging Challenge - NGC 1097 :D

I cleaned my filters and CCD window and it made a hell of a difference with fewer and much less obvious dust motes, so this image has no darks and no flats!

Autoguiding was spot on and all of the 30 odd subs at 4 - 6 min each were good :thumbsup:

It's an LRGB = 100 20 20 24 min

Deffinitely not enough colour data under light polluted skies (I should have binned the RGB 2X2... doh!) but I did ma best with what I had.

26K file:

http://upload.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/68449717/large

800K file:

http://upload.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/68449717/original

Hope yas like it :P

Cheers

Mike

[strongmanmike]

Here is the Luminance only image (100min)

430K file:

http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/68451256/original

This shows more detail in the galaxy buuuut I can't quite see the jets...? :P

Cheers

Mike

[Dennis]

Hi Mike

The image is spoiled by the too round stars and wealth of gorgeous detail; a real world image would have slightly elongated stars with fuzzy bits, evidence of a gradient or two and a smattering of noise.;)

But seriously, this is an amazing image. The detail is awesome and the acquisition and processing spot on.:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Cheers

Dennis

[spacezebra]

All beautiful and detailed images - you are all truly talented

Cheers Petra

[Garyh]

Top images like always Mike....:eyepop:

Here`s my second attempt at it as my first was very noisey, Consists of the original 7 frames at 4min 1600 iso plus 4 frames at 8 min at 800 iso. Seeing was not as good as the night before but overall I am pretty happy with this go..might add some more frames to it tonight if not too tired and the seeing is good...
Cheers Gary.....:thumbsup:

[rogerg]

I noticed this thread while messing around with my Losmandy last night and thought I may as well put the SBIG to use. I'm reasonably happy with the raw images but can't get even brightness across the image - the core is bleeding out too much. Really just a problem caused by the fact my old PhotoShop version (5.5) can't load FITS so I have to convert them to TIF and then adjust levels/gamma .... so I lose information. Hmm. Money money money.

Interestingly there's clearly a edge-on galaxy in the top left. I've attached a brightened version to show it clearer.

Viewing was pretty bad, Rigel was blinking on and off like a strobe light.

Roger.

[tornado33]

Great shots all
When the morning moons gone I will see if I can get an image of this object with the 10 inch scope.
Scott

[spearo]

All great shots
looks like it's a real challenge this month with such a faint object
Ill have to give it a go this week
keep 'em komin'!
frank

[strongmanmike]

Het Roger that's a good image mate! How'd ya get the stars so round with a LX200 classic?? wow!

Yes that is an edge on spiral in the image, it shows up ok in my Luminance too - I think I had beeter seeing ?:

http://upload.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/68566814/original

Cheers

Mike

[JohnH]

This little sucker finally got above the trees on a moonless night for me...10x3 mins at iso 1600 using the Canon20d at prime on the VC200L...not too happy with it, I had to push pretty hard, I need more photons...

[tornado33]

Heres my effort. Its the longest galaxy imaging session Ive ever done, a whopping 115 mins. Skies got surprisingly dark for Newcastle so I kept on going.
10 inch F5.6 Newtonian, 23x5 mins ISO 400, uv/ir filter used on modded 350D, processed in Iris, including colour and dynamuc stretching, then masking in Photoshop. Noiseware also used.
Larger version here http://www.iceinspace.com.au/uploads/ngc%201097%2023x5mins%20iso400maske d_filteredbig.jpg
Scott

[PhotonCollector]

Hello everyone,
Congratulations to all of you that chased down NGC 1097 with your astro-imaging rigs. All of you presented fine photos - well done.
The poor weather contributed to not capturing NGC 1097 myself but you can see an older image I did about a year ago with astandard Canon 300D (not modified) at this link;
http://www.skylab.com.au/pmsa/ngc%201097b.html
Now to next month's challenge. For the November Deep Sky Challenge I would like to nominate rogerg (I hope you haven't been nominated recently?)
rogerg come on down... your next month's guest to select the deep sky object for the November 2006 Deep Sky Challenge.best regards and clear skies Paul Mayo
PS. Not sure what is going on with the text editor on IIS - keeps removing paragraph spacing so you end up with a mess of text - sorry.

[Ric]

Great image Scott and the colour and detail really stands out.
NGC1097 was very shy for me, it has parked itself behind a tree and will not come out. It may be time for some stealth pruning in the middle of the night.

Cheers

[rogerg]

Ahh... excellent, I think picking the object will be harder than photographing it :lol: I will take a look and seeh what I can find in the next couple of days. Hmmmmm... decisions decisions. Well it'll have to be a galaxy or collection of.....

(and no, haven't been nominated ever..)

Roger.

[tornado33]

Thanks. The Colour Stretch function in IRIS is great for bringing out galaxy colours.
I eagerly await Rogerg's descision for November :)

[Ric]

Hi all, I finally managed to get an image in for the challenge, a bit late but I did take it in October :D
It's a bit rough and over cooked, but overall not toooo bad :whistle:
It is composed of
10 images in luminescence @ 21 seconds each
Processed in MaximDL

cheers