The Pavo Galaxy - NGC 6744 (added a core close up)

[strongmanmike]

With clear nights with no Moon, work or family commitments getting in the road :rolleyes: not exactly in abundance..aaand being inherently laaazy :whistle:...I decided to move away from tiny planetary nebs and shoot something I could nab reasonably well in a single night..and I just managed to squeeeeze this in one :thumbsup:

So to get the annual NGC 6744 season rolling... here she is :)

As most would know this galaxy has a rather low surface brightness, especially those outer really faint arms that spread a fair way out from the main body of the galaxy so, as always, I tried to reveal as much as possible while keeping the relative brightnesses accurate with global stretching only.

The Pavo Galaxy (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/163821158/original)

A higher contrast stretch (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/163842809/original) of the over 6hrs of Luminance data shows the extent of the very faintest outer spiral arms and details and even some very faint Milky Way cirrus dust.

Close up study of the core (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/163861961/original) reveals the inner dust lane goes right to the very bright core

Mike

[Atmos]

That's really nice Mike, trounced my attempt at it a few months back! Very nicely resolved.

[TR]

Nice detail in the core Mike.

[atalas]

:thumbsup:Good one Mike

[Placidus]

Wow! :eyepop: The fine spiralling dust lanes close in to the core are amazing.

[topheart]

You are a one night wonder Mike!

Well done!
Cheers,
Tim

[RickS]

A fine result, Mike, especially for a single night. Lovely detail!

[Stevec35]

That is indeed impressive for only one night Mike!

Cheers

Steve

[gregbradley]

That looks great Mike. This one is my favourite southern galaxy.

I also see the hint of a spiral arm right up the top a bit to the right. I haven't seen that before.

Greg.

[alpal]

I agree - there is detail in the core that is not in this APOD:
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap140808.html


well done Mike.

cheers
Allan

[troypiggo]

Lovely. Fills the FOV nicely.

[codemonkey]

Great work Mike! I've imaged that once before and that's an excellent result, even more so for one night of data. What's the sky like where this was captured? Dark?

I've been planning on having another shot at this soon, just been waiting for it to get high enough. Although, it's a toss up, do I redo this or have a crack at Barnard's galaxy?

[strongmanmike]

Thanks for the feedback everyone :thumbsup:



Cheers Tim....hopefully I will be able to manage a few more hits than Paul Lekakis (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXMrDu7374Y)...?

:question:...great song....



Yes noticed that too, it shows well if you highly stretch the data, as does the huge faint curved arm on the far right



Thanks Al :thumbsup:..and Don's was 17.5hrs taken from Coona with a 20" CDK too :D



Cheers Lee, my skies are quite good, about Bortel 3.5 overall but much darker to the North and West (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/157678418/original)

Well, Barnards galaxy sits in a very faint but beautiful field of faint striated Milky Way dust...so I recon have a shot for that! :thumbsup:

Mike

[marc4darkskies]

Looks great Mike! :thumbsup: Colours look quite natural too!

Cheers, Marcus

[strongmanmike]

I'll take that one from you then Marcus :thumbsup:, you are one I always wait to hear from about my..?.. colourfulness in galaxies :D

Mike

[Ryderscope]

Thanks for posting Mike. A great example of NGC 6744. I will use this as a benchmark for data I'm capturing on this object at the moment.

I see that there is no Ha data included. Does this mean that there is none worth bothering with for this object?

[jjjnettie]

Another stunner!

[strongmanmike]

Cheers Rod, I did consider getting some Ha but I ran out of time (would have had to stretch it to two nights :eyepop:) ...may still get some yet, still, was happy with the general colour distribution revealed within the galaxy none the less.



Thanks JJJ :thumbsup:

Mike

[Fabiomax]

Wow,
Really nice and detailed!
Fabiomax

[strongmanmike]

Cheers Fab, I was happy with the detail :thumbsup:

Mike

[Cosmic]

Stunning Mike, loving the images that you produce. Always a pleasure to view your work :thumbsup:

[Slawomir]

Echoing others -beautiful execution Mike and a wonderful example for us mortals of how things should be done :thumbsup:

[strongmanmike]

Thanks for the very kind words fella's, glad you enjoyed the image, makes the effort even more worth it :)

Mike

[strongmanmike]

Just for fun I have added a link to a close view of the inner core region of NGC 6744, the inner dust lane appears to go right into the bright core..?

Core of NGC 6744 (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/163861961/original)

Mike

[multiweb]

Cool galaxy. Very nice pic :thumbsup: I had a go at it at Mike's place (https://onedrive.live.com/?cid=6930D3AD12D5044C&id=6930D3AD12D5044C%211377&parId=6930D3AD12D5044C%211376&o=OneUp) but it's so tiny. We have a couple of good nights coming up in Sydney and I'm going to dust off the C11 and give it a go. Should fill the FOV of the QHY9 nicely. If I can guide that tight.

[strongmanmike]

Cheers Marc :thumbsup:

Actually it's a good size for a galaxy, the bright spiral arms are about 15 arc min wide and the fainter outer arms bring it up to nearly 25 arc min.

Mike

[Placidus]

This is really good stuff, Mike. What's happening near the very core of a galaxy, near the black hole, is likely far more important than what's happening in the extreme outermost halo.

[strongmanmike]

I agree, I wonder what relationship/mechanism there might be in a dust lane that extends right to the very core of a galaxy :question:

Mike

[Retrograde]

Fantastic stuff Mike. A great overall image of course but those core details are really something else!

[strongmanmike]

Thanks a lot Pete, great stuff what we image huh? I love peering into images more closely to see what might be there...like maaaaybeeeee a small faint elliptical smudge! :D

Mike