<Sigh> Weather here continues to suck! This image was taken over 4 clear moonless nights during 2 lunar cycles (!), and then only gathering 8 hours of usable data (seeing, clouds etc)
In any case, whinging aside, here is NGC 3521 - a "Flocculent" galaxy in Leo. The seeing was average (on a scale of excellent-good-average-fair-poor-hopeless). The image scale has been reduced by 25% to mask some of the artefacts from a relatively small integration time and average seeing. I managed to show off the bright colourful core and the "bubble" easily and the dimmer halo elements also came out reasonably well with some pushing. There are some fainter arcs and streams further out but there's no way I could get sky dark and clear enough to be able to render them.
Exposure details below the image.
75% full scale
Use <Cntrl Minus> to zoom out & <Cntrl Plus> to zoom in
Hi Marcus,
what a wonderful picture you've taken.
That Officina Stellare ProRC 360 is such a premium scope.
I would say that you must be very pleased with the results.
I wish you plenty of better weather to come so that you can put
that scope through it's paces on many targets.
Yes, very nice result even without great conditions (or 22hrs of exposure ) It's a very cool galaxy, the focculentness makes it I recon? FWIW, it looks good scaled back another 30% actually, that's not a criticism, just looks even better when you can take it all in at once
Love it. One of my favourite galaxies and you've done a superb job. The stars look amazing as well.
Greg.
Cheers Greg! Glad you liked it! Hey, we looked at some property in Bigga a week ago (we're going to move one day in the not too distant future). It was very remote - an hour from Crookwell!
Quote:
Originally Posted by billdan
Great image Marcus, a lot of steam coming off that boiling cauldron
Cheers
Bill
Thanks Bill!
Quote:
Originally Posted by alpal
Hi Marcus,
what a wonderful picture you've taken.
That Officina Stellare ProRC 360 is such a premium scope.
I would say that you must be very pleased with the results.
I wish you plenty of better weather to come so that you can put
that scope through it's paces on many targets.
cheers
Allan
Thanks very much Allan! Very glad you think so! Yep, the OS sings when the conditions are right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by markas
Splendid result, Marcus!
Mark
Thanks Mark!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Octane
I agree with Mike and Trish. Looking at that evokes some pretty deep emotions.
I spent a good five minutes just staring at it.
Mission accomplished.
H
High praise indeed H! Thanks very much!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter Ward
A great result. Wonderful.
Cheers Peter! I just checked CFN for the next few days - yep, you guessed it - clear skies leading up to full moon!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stevec35
Looks good to me Marcus. A pretty good result for the conditions.
BTW it's "flocculent".
Cheers
Steve
Thanks Steve! I'll fix my spelling!
Quote:
Originally Posted by strongmanmike
Yes, very nice result even without great conditions (or 22hrs of exposure ) It's a very cool galaxy, the focculentness makes it I recon? FWIW, it looks good scaled back another 30% actually, that's not a criticism, just looks even better when you can take it all in at once
Fantastic Marcus! Keep coming back to it, love the "fluffy" outer dusty extensions.
Thanks very much Colin! Glad you like it so much!
Quote:
Originally Posted by topheart
Hi Marcus,
That is awe inspiring!
Wonderful!
Cheers,
Tim
Cheers Tim. When you stop and think about what your looking at it is pretty awesome. That's why this is such a great (and sometimes frustrating) hobby!
Quote:
Originally Posted by batema
Beautiful image. I wish you had great seeing conditions.
Mark
Me too! Thanks Mark! I'd be just as happy with less cloud though!
Very nice! I just discovered this one the other day and was hoping to image it myself, alas I think it's going to be behind a nice big gum tree on my neighbour's property by the time I can get to imaging it.
Even my wife liked this one when she saw it, and she usually rolls her eyes and mutters something about "spirally ****" whenever she sees me looking at galaxies.
) 
