47 Tuc and two friends

[strongmanmike]

Took this on Saturday morning as a quicky before day break.

The link below is to the 40% size 1.6deg X 1.6deg full fame image but as usual if you click on the image after it opens you will be taken to an album of other versions including close ups of all three globulars :thumbsup:

47 Tuc and two friends (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/127262407/original) (2.6meg)

The small glob top right in the image is NGC 121 but my star chart program doesn't have the one on the left - any ideas?

Mike

[Alchemy]

Without booting up the big computer can't help with identification, too early I'm the morning... I just look and go mmmmmmm nice,
It sure is a nice combo you have there, wouldn't mind a 6 inch scope myself.

Cheers clive

[Tom Davis]

Very pretty!! Luv the FOV!

Tom

[telecasterguru]

Beautiful view.

[seeker372011]

pretty!

[bojan]

I would call this photo 47 Tuc and four friends
there is another, smaller, just above the left one (un-identified), and yet another one above this one, two times higher and to the right, so the whole chain forms the 1/6th circle, centred at 47 Tuc.
Impressive image..

[gregbradley]

Nicely done Mike. 47 Tuc is hard to present well due to its super high dynamic range. You managed that very well.

Greg.

[Paul Haese]

Nice framing and resolution of this somewhat difficult object. I found last time I imaged this that I was get blown highlights. Did you use shorter subs for the core? I am thinking not given that it looks like you took 5 minute subs on it the colour. Star colour is superb too. Lovely image.

[DavidU]

That's impressive Mike. The res of the tiny stars in excellent.Guiding must be perfect!

[TrevorW]

Nice Tuc

[strongmanmike]

Cheers guys

As usual such short exposures are pretty hard to work with but in the end I was meeeh so-so :shrug: about it I guess :question:

Bojan, yes the LMC is just poking in the top left corner so all those clusters are part of the LMC.

Paul, cheers mate, you are right, one of the harder obects to process for sure. I did do short and long exposures 2min and 10min. It was 4 X 10min + 10 X 2min Lum, 7 X 2min each for RGB (I rounded it up to 15min each in my image credits :P) so as I said it was a quicky!

Mike

[mithrandir]

Wish I could get stars that sharp.

unimap says PGC260239. Solved image attached. I was quite surprised that 21% quality the text was still readable.

[rogerg]

Nice image, nice star colour and sharpness.

[Paul Haese]

Ah that makes sense. I am thinking I might give this a shot next time myself. It is often easy to over look these remarkable objects when other more colourful objects exist. Thanks for the tip on the colour. I don't mind that you rounded up.;)

[Rob_K]

Beautiful image Mike! :thumbsup:



The one above the LH cluster is an open cluster, ESO 28-22, aka Cl Kron 7, Cl Lindsay 11, & [RZ2005] 4. The faint one two times higher and to the right is another open cluster, Cl Lindsay 14, aka [RZ 2005] 9. Info from Aladin, Simbad catalogue.

Cheers -

[jase]

Excellent Mike. Like the panel of different views...getting more value from your data set.

[strongmanmike]

Funny you should say that Dave, I use my dy/dx guide figures and the excellent real time guide star centroid plot in Astroart to gauge the seeing. The seeing was at best very average on Friday night fluctuating all over the place. I was imaging NGC 6774 in Pavo when all of a sudden the seeing rapidly improved and as expected the guiding settled and the subs came down sharp as a tack for about an hour or so...the rest of the night was back to fairly fuzzy :rolleyes:. The attached screen shot shows the guide star history of that hour or so of good seeing. As you can see not a single excusion outside the 1 pix radius (2"/pix at 1200mm FL with guide camera binned 2X2). I was using just 1sec guide exposures so those eight anomalous out-lier plots represent no more than about 10sec of the whole hour or so! The vast majority of plots land in the centre 1/3 of the ring = orgasmic...who needs AO :P. Last imaging session when I imaged The Lobster Nebula it was like this the whole bluddy night virtually, now THAT was heaven :love:

Mike
easily turned on by a steady guide star :screwy:

[strongmanmike]

Ta Andrew, just added the reference to my web image :thumbsup: I was surprised Star Atlas Pro didn't list it :shrug:

Mike

[DavidU]

Beautiful looking guide Mike. The Jet stream map is horrendous all over Oz at the moment.

[strongmanmike]

Thanks jase

As Paul suggested 47 Tuc is a bugger to process well, rather like the Orion Nebula. I am not overly happy with the final result and I have a few final versions I have been tossing up between but it depends on the time of day and which screen (work or home) that I look at it on as to which looks the best....so bah this will do :question:...or I'll go :screwy: (er!) :P

Mike

[Bassnut]

A tight, hi contrast, colourfull pic there Mike. To many stars and some odd screaming yellow stars in the middle, but given the lack of posted images lately, a pleasure to veiw.

[strongmanmike]

Cheers FV :thumbsup:



Sorry bout that, I will remove some post haste :P




Well there's HST and VLT etc shots around just like this...so there! :P



Always happy when I have pleased Fred :thumbsup:

Mike

[marco]

Great image as usual Mike! I love the color processing and balance, maybe a bit too saturated in the center of the cluster.

I am trying to set up my TEC140 Apo down there as well, hope to be able to image through it soon, your pics are too inspiring ;)

Clear Skies
Marco

[multiweb]

Great contrast and star colors. Quite amazing the resolution you got in that shot. The only thing I don't like is the yellow stars saturation in the core. They stick out a lot but then again I've never seen a shot that sharp before so that maybe the norm? Top shelf work. :thumbsup:

[blueskies123_89]

Beautiful shot, lovely colours and pinpoint stars! I would give anything to take an image like that!

[Screwdriverone]

Hi Mike,

Super sexy shot that.

Cartes Du Ciel reckons it is NGC 152... ahh but it seems this is wrong after looking at the rest of this post and the plate solves....Do'h. I really should read all the posts before trying to be a smart arse...sorry.

Berry nice...

Cheers

Chris

[alexch]

Great image, Mike. Definitely one of the best 47Tuc I've seen.

Thanks for sharing!

Alex

[alexch]

Great image, Mike. Definitely one of the best 47Tuc photographs I've seen.

Thanks for sharing!

Alex

[Screwdriverone]

Is there an echo in here.....here.....here.....here.... ..?

Cheers ;)

Chris

[Rob_K]

PGC260239 is a tiny galaxy behind the edge of the cluster. The star cluster is ESO 28-19 (from Aladin). :thumbsup:

Cheers -

[strongmanmike]

Cheers for checking the image out guys, glad it was worth the effort :thumbsup:

Regarding the yellow stars in the centre of the glob, they are red giants. If you notice there are prominent yellow stars right across the glob, the ones across the core stand out more as the background is a sea of whiter stars with little separation, I think most images of 47 Tuc simply wash these inner yellow stars out..?

Here is a link to show it is real :thumbsup:

VLT and Hubble:
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/47_Tucanae.html

Mike

[marc4darkskies]

It's amazing how some of the brightest and most well known objects are so difficult to process (like Orion)!! When I imaged this same scene it took me a number of iterations to get reasonably happy with it. I'm going to be honest with you though Mike, I think this is just a little too saturated. The almost purple halos and screaming yellow stars overwhelm the scene. Yes I know they're real, but just a minor tweak to tone them down a bit will make this image more striking IMHO.

Cheers, Marcus

[Coen]

Nice pictures, minor edit - your close ups of NGC121 and ESO28-19, I suspect they are in the SMC not the LMC i.e. typo with the L & S.;)

Always have a soft spot for GCs, something about wondering what the sky would be like from a planet orbiting one of the stars (assuming such a stable orbit could be found).

[Jen]

:D nice shot for a quicky :lol: Good to see 47tuc & friends great stuff buddy :thumbsup::thumbsup: