I have been wanting to image this great field of contrasting galaxies for a while, I had it all planned for 2 or 3 nights during IISAC 2008 but the weather was crap and I didn't even take my scope to Lostock
I would have done it last IISAC but the same thing, unpredictable weather.....

I did try and get Humi to image it at IISAC 2009 but bah!...he was too chicken

Well last week saw a couple of great nights of clear steady skies at my dark sky site so I was finally able to grab this sought after field as it was at the meridian on dark and I could image it down into the west (my darkest horizon) during our short summer nights.
It was a challenging field to process in a balanced way, eliptical galaxies are always hard to get right I recon...so I hope you like'em

More exposure would have been good but I am happy with what I got (beggers can't be chosers)
Small full frame image (1meg):
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...28357/original
Large Full frame image - great to swim around in (2meg):
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...28378/original
100% resolution crop of NGC 1365 (600k)
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...28384/original
Awsome eliptical galaxies at the heart of the cluster (1meg)
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...28848/original
Close up of cute little Saturn Galaxy NGC 1381 (200k)
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...28924/original
For those with good broadband who want to see it all in one go at full resolution...here it is (5meg)
http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike20...30330/original
Cheers
Mike