From Leo, with roars...

[Camelopardalis]

Folks,

While the distant roars of the coastal heat storms brought an end to the heatwave last weekend, I headed for the hills and took advantage of the northern aspect at a wonderfully dark site.

Of course, this is M65, M66 and NGC3628, the Leo Triplet.

Even in southern QLD these are not dancing spectacularly high for imaging, with photons captured over three nights. Lots of brow rubbing ensued while processing this one.

Skywatcher Esprit 100 / ZWO ASI1600MM / NEQ6.

Constructive criticism welcomed!

Cheers,
Dunk

[alpal]

Hi Dunk,
excellent picture - I can't fault it.

cheers
Allan

[strongmanmike]

An excellent shot of these famous three galaxies Dunk, you should feel very satisfied after all your efforts, dark skies rule :thumbsup:

Mike

[Ryderscope]

Nice one Dunk, lots of good detail in the galaxies. I might have lifted the colour saturation just a tad to show them off a little more (but thats just me). Image looks well processed and nice even star contours across the field. A great little trio for sure :thumbsup:

[RickS]

Great result, Dunk! Just needs some diffraction spikes and it would even better :P

[multiweb]

Oooh... very nice. I like it. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Allan!



Thanks Mike! Definitely worth the trip :)



Thanks Rodney! I contemplated waving a little sharpen over the galaxy cores too, but resisted :sadeyes:



Ha ha, thanks Rick! That's a work in progress...just don't want to waste valuable dark sky time shaking down a new scope :screwy:



Thanks Marc!

[Atmos]

It looks really good Dunk!
Detail in the galaxies is good and the stars look perfect.

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Colin :thumbsup:

I even cropped it down as much as I dared to balance the detail out - the full FOV is just shy of 2 degrees, but only a little over 1 shown here!

[Camelopardalis]

Rick - how about this? ;)

[codemonkey]

That's excellent work, Dunk, I can't find fault with it so no constructive criticism here.

I didn't even know we could see them down here -- when looking for targets I exclude everything above Dec 0 'cause I have a giant gum tree to the north of the observatory :(

[atalas]

Top shot Dunk :thumbsup:

[RobC]

Great image Dunk. You must be pleased with it. Speaks volumes for you scope camera combination and processing skills.

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Lee - you might want to measure that gum tree, they reach almost 50 degrees altitude and would be framed well by a fast newt ;)



Thanks Louie!



Thanks Rob! That scope keeps giving and giving :thumbsup:

[raymo]

Your 1100D does a great job Dunk.:):)
raymo

[leon]

No Criticism, of any nature needed here Dunk, beautiful image indeed, well done.

Leon

[Zubenel]

Hi Dunk, this is a bucket list shot for me . You have set the bench mark!! I love the colour and internal detail👍. Thanks for the share .

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks raymo, we’ve come a long way ;)



Thanks Leon!



Thanks Wes - just goes to show it doesn’t need a big newt/RC to have a fair crack at this one :)

[JA]

Great image Dunk :thumbsup::thumbsup:

Best
JA

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks JA!

[Placidus]

Very fine indeed

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Mike & Trish!

[alocky]

I've been on these guys for a few hours too - yours is a great capture and very nicely processed. I wonder how close is the noise floor to where you've black clipped it? It almost looks like some of the fainter structure in the image is trying to peek through - I know it's a matter of taste and monitor calibration though!
Great field, isn't it?
cheers,
Andrew.

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Andrew. Very eagle eyed to see those from the small jpeg! There are certainly some wispy bits below M66 in the luminance, and a long prominence running up from 3628.

Unusually for me I took a conservative approach to stretching this data, but they are there with a little more encouragement...they just didn’t survive into the LRGB combo.

[willik]

Very nice image great detail
Martin

[alocky]

No eagle eyes here! I’d just spent a day on the same bit of sky and been through exactly the same thought process. The area is so rich with background galaxies it’s definitely worth seeing what you can squeeze out!

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Martin!

[Camelopardalis]

I’ll see what I can rustle up ;)