The Whirlpool Galaxy, 30 Million Light Years away. Over 8 Hours of Exposure Taken With Multiple Telescopes.
https://i.redd.it/o0iqt5cdml1f1.jpeg
The Whirlpool Galaxy, 30 Million Light Years away. Over 8 Hours of Exposure Taken With Multiple Telescopes.
https://i.redd.it/o0iqt5cdml1f1.jpeg
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This is our (@aj.smadi and @astr.max on Instagram) sharpest image of the Whirlpool galaxy, combining nearly 8 hours of data from two telescopes to reveal a wide range of details.
The Whirlpool is a famous interacting pair of galaxies; the first to be classified as a spiral. It is located 31 million light years away, stretches around 70,000 light years across, and is home to at least 50 billion stars.
The galaxy and its companion, NGC 5195, are easily observed by amateur astronomers, and the two galaxies may even be seen with binoculars. These islands of stars are merging and will form one galaxy in a few hundred million years.
Many background galaxies are visible as well, which are hundreds of millions of light years away (tens of times farther than the Whirlpool) from us.
Acquisition/processing:
@astr.max: Celestron Edge HD 8”, ASI2600MC Pro, Skywatcher Wave 100i Mount. 6.7 hours integration time at 180 second subs.
@aj.smadi: Celestron Evolution 9.25”, ASI294MC Pro, Celestron Alt-Az Mount. 60 minutes integration time at 30 second subs.
Stacked on DeepSkyStacker, Edited on Lightroom and Siril, Blended in Adobe PS Express.
How do you combine it, so it turns out so colourful?
And our ancestors were literally monkeys in trees when the light left that galaxy.
The realization that we will most likely never explore any of the universe or see life out there is so depressing