NGC6744

I finally managed to capture my first galaxy, NGC 6744. This is an intermediate spiral spiral galaxy and is considered very similar in structure to our own milky way. This object is 30 million light years away which makes it by far the most distant object I have ever imaged. In the image you can also distinguish the distorted companion galaxy.

NGC 6744

Image details

• Telescope: Stellarvue SV-105
• Camera: SBIG ST-8300M
• Exposure: 12 x 5 min + 4 x 7 min (L), 5 x 5 min (RGB)
• Mount: Skywatcher EQ6 (with EQMod)
• Guider: SBIG ST-i (off axis)
• Location: Outside Nelspruit, South Africa
• Software: Image acquisition in CCDOps, processing in PixInsight

Trifid Nebula

Another cold but clear night here in Nelspruit and things went quite well during the set up of the equipment, imaging was progressing within an hour of starting to set up. The target was the Trifid Nebula, also known as M20 or NGC 6514, this object is something I have wanted to capture for some time now. It's a rather peculiar object located 5000 ly away in the constellation of Sagittarius. It is actually a combination of a few different types of objects, the red part is an emission nebula, the blue portion at the top is a reflection nebula and there is even a dark nebula included in the dust obscuring the emission nebula. All in all a very interesting object. I particularly like how the dust and structures in the emission nebula came out.

M20

Image details

• Telescope: Stellarvue SV-105
• Camera: SBIG ST-8300M
• Exposure: 12 x 5 min (L), 6 x 5 min (RGB)
• Mount: Skywatcher EQ6 (with EQMod)
• Guider: SBIG ST-i (off axis)
• Location: Outside Nelspruit, South Africa
• Software: Image acquisition in CCDOps, processing in PixInsight

Below is a cropped version of the details in the nebula.

Next time I hope to have captured my first galaxy.