NGC 5139 Omega Centauri under Clear Sydney Skies

[Startrek]

Captured a quick hour on the Omega glob last night in Sydney under a 50% waxing moon with pretty good conditions.
Although 47 Tuc and M22 are my favourite Globs , Omega has the “Wow factor” when someone sees it for the first time.
Same rig my little 6” newt and EQ6-R mount
2600MC camera -10C , Gain 101
Guiding was excellent ( 0.50 to 0.60 total )
62 x 60 sec subs ( dithered every 3rd )
Flats and Bias
As always in Sydney, battled with heavy gradients but having the atmosphere fairly stable makes a huge difference
Stacked in DSS
Processed in Startools v1.8 , Linear OSC
Used the Spatially Variant PSF Deconvolution module in Startools to good advantage , reduced atmospheric blur and tightened up the Stars

Astrobin link below …..

https://www.astrobin.com/dhoe1d/

Original frame version
Crop version

Comments welcome
Thanks

PS The previous night I captured a few hours on M83 but haven’t looked at the data as ye

[AstroViking]

Great image of the cluster, Martin. It's hard to wrap your head around the fact that each of those dots is a whole solar system, all jammed so close together...

[croweater]

I like it Martin. You squeeze great images out of that little reflector. Even though the stars look so close together, I wonder what the average distance between the stars is.
Cheers, Richard

[Startrek]

Thanks Steve,
I actually captured nearly 2 hours but culled an hour for 2 reasons , one is a found quite a few some subs with slightly bloated stars ( atmosphere ) and two , the Skyglow at low altitudes and early in the evening is ridiculous, once your target gets above 40 degrees later into the evening ( say 9.30 -10.00pm ) the Skyglow does reduce a bit and keeps reducing a bit until just after midnight. It’s still bad in the early hours but no where near as bad as earlier in the evening. I use Astap to review my subs and you can actually see the change in Skyglow as you flick through the subs. I guess as approx 5 to 6 million folk go to bed at 10pm to 11pm in Sydney, they turn lights off in the home and backyard , so that could be anywhere from 10 million to 50 million lights turns off , plus industry slows down 50% so that’s possibly another 10 million lights.
It’s incredible you can see the change in Skyglow from 9.30 pm to say 2.00am on your subs.

In regards to Omega and the trillions and trillions of Stars , I’d like to see a 3D model of it and see how deep ( in light years) this giant glob really is !!!
Thanks
Pretty happy with this quick snap !

Martin

[Stephane]

Lovely Martin, nice and tight! I might try this target some day.

[Startrek]

Thanks Richard
The humble 6” Newt is an underrated and under used scope for AP , a great beginner scope , an all rounder. I’m still using mine after 6 years
I’m retiring my 6” soon for my new 8” f5 Carbon fibre arriving from Germany soon. Anyone what a great scope set up ready to go !!!
I’m guessing the distance between stars in this glob must be light years , I’ve never really looked into the Astro science of this wonderful celestial object in our southern skies but I should
Cheers
Martin

[croweater]

Hi Martin. I had a quick look at Wikipedia and it says a distance only 0.1 light years at the core. What surprised me is there is evidence for a 40000 solar mass black hole at the centre of the cluster. I never really imagined a black hole being at a cluster centre.
Cheers, Richard

[Dave882]

That's lovely Martin!! Wow so sharp and the colours are beautiful. Great work:thumbsup:

[Startrek]

Thanks Stephane
It’s nicely placed now and for the next month or so for your new 8” Sidereal
You only need an hour or so on it with that scope
Give it a whirl next clear night
It is the big daddy of globular clusters
Cheers
Martin

[Startrek]

Thanks Dave
I’ve captured this object every year since my DSLR days back in 2017
A quick capture the other night but the results were pleasing from my little Newt
Cheers
Martin

[Startrek]

Richard,
Thanks for the information
Black holes in the centre of a cluster ? Unusual to say the least
Martin

[ChrisD]

I remember reading that Omega C. is believed to be a remnant galactic core of a galaxy torn apart by the milky way some time ago. I guess it came with its own black hole.

Really nice image Martin, Omega C, is one of my favourites.

Chris

[croweater]

Hi Chris , yes you are right. I read a bit further and apparently it was the core of a dwarf galaxy. Plus the black hole mass was revised to 12000 solar masses.
Cheers, Richard