Took this on Monday night from the outer fringe of Melbourne, Bortle 4 skies.
I reckon I picked the coldest and dewiest night this week, my equipment was saturated by the time I gave it away at about 1.30am Tuesday. The galaxy was that low my scope was horizontal while tracking it as it brushed the trees in the distance. I only got 35mins worth of a combination of 3 min guided and 90secs unguided. I couldn't get Phd2 to lock on the guide star properly due I guess to the turbulence associated with shooting something that low near the horizon.
Consequently, I had to stretch this a fair bit to get some detail out of it but from where I captured it and the short integration time, I don't think it's too bad. I've captured this before from Bortle 3 skies an hours drive north of Melbourne from a high ridge I frequent occasionally, so this is a first for me from lower ground this far south.
Equipment used: Modded Canon 550d with UVIR cut filter connected to a SW Esprit 100 on an HEQ5pro mount. 35 minutes of 180 and 90 seconds at 800 iso. 3 min subs autoguided with Phd2 using a ZWO ASI120mm through a 50mm mini guidescope and one frozen operator!
P.S. I had some data I took back in 2017 using the same scope and a little further north at 37.3 degrees south. I've added it to Monday's data and this is what I got. A little more than 60 mins total integration now, I think has made an improvement
. The last shot was taken with a Canon G12 compact camera mounted on a tripod to show the near horzontal position of the OTA while capturing this object.