ESO 305-9 - more faint and obscure stuff

[Stevec35]

ESO 305-9 (AKA PGC 16790) is a fairly large galaxy in the Columba group that includes NGC 1792 and NGC 1808. I guess it's not bright enough to have gained a NGC designation. Having previously imaged NGC 1792 and NGC 1808 I thought I would have a go at this one. All three are pretty close together and a mosaic may be feasible with a shorter focal length.

Cheers

Steve

http://members.pcug.org.au/~stevec/ESO305-9_STXL6303_RC14.htm

[strongmanmike]

Good time for some less traveled galaxies this time of year Steve. This one has an irregular spiral nature about it, interesting target, thanks for the looksee.

Mike

[RickS]

Very cool, Steve! A surface brightness of 23.8 mag/arcsec^2 according to one source. Quite a challenging target :thumbsup:

Cheers,
Rick.

[sjastro]

Very nice Steve.

I'm partial to indistinct faint objects.

Hope you don't mind but I processed your image to extract some more details out of the galaxy by using a mathematical function I came up with a while back.

With raw images I think the result would be more dramatic.

The before and after are attached.

Regards

Steven

[clive milne]

The 'win' is strong within this one, master Yoda!

[Stevec35]

Thanks Clive (I think)



Thanks Steven. Your new function seems to have made some difference all right. I played around with HDR a bit which can yield similar results but you have to be careful not to overdo it.



Thanks Rick. The STXL6303 seems to be good at this sort of thing



Thanks Mike. Might have an ESO open cluster coming up next if the weather holds.

[atalas]

A great galaxy shot Steve....little galaxies all through the field as well...very nice.

Yes,looks like the luminosity is suppressed a bit in your shot which Steven has addressed....well done.

[Stevec35]

Thanks Louie. Yes, Steven's version looks better. Clearly a bit more tweaking to be done.

[Bassnut]

Nice one Steve, good result with what looks like not a lot of exposure time. Stevens tweak is even better. And yes, I think the STXL6303 is pretty good at dim stuff too.

[Stevec35]

Thanks Fred. Actually I thought 8 hours of luminance was a fair bit of exposure time but I suppose it's not much by your standards. I've tweaked it a bit - not sure if it's an improvement.

[Bassnut]

Actually, I now bothered to divide 480 by 60, OK, 8 hrs is a lot for lum, shows how dim it is. Im still thinking Stevens tweak is better, but yours now is close enough.

[gregbradley]

A new road being travelled there Steve.

Greg.

[clive milne]

Just to clarify... I love the image and the fact that you walk the path less travelled.

:thumbsup:

[Peter Ward]

Reminds me of a piece by one of Australia's greatest treasures (see attached)
....and I'm no doubt showing my age by recalling Michael's superb social commentary at the time.

[Stevec35]

Thanks. Steven's method appears to show promise.



Someone has to travel it I guess. It certainly vastly increases the number of things available to photograph.



Thanks Clive



A particularly good Leunig cartoon. Does that mean you like the image too? Of course it's not as showy as some of the great images of common objects that get posted here.

[Peter Ward]

Not mainstream and likely under-appreciated, but I do indeed like it. :thumbsup:

[Placidus]

A lovely discovery, well photographed.

[Stevec35]

Thanks guys. Came out fairly well considering my light polluted location.



Good to hear