This image of Messier 46 has also been at the Tacande Observatory in El Paso on La Palma. In fact this is a quite rare object in the sense that it is a star cluster with a planetary nebula. The nebula somehow looks like an eye in the nowhere of space. The image shown above is just an excerpt of the full frame. It is only one 4 minute shot with a modified EOS6D camera with ISO 800. The image is also available in full resolution here.
Clear skies!
Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 12:33 pm
 | Date | 2017/03/27 |
 | Location | La Palma / Spain |
 | Object | Messier 100 (spiral galaxy) |
 | Camera | Atik383L+ |
 | Guiding | yes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG |
 | Telescope | 8" GSO Newtonian |
 | Barlow lens | none |
 | Mount | EQ6Syntrek |
 | Cooling | -10°C |
 | Luminance | 11x 600s, bin: 1x1 |
 | Red | 9x 150s, bin: 2x2 |
 | Green | 9x 150s, bin: 2x2 |
 | Blue | 9x 150s, bin: 2x2 |
 | Dark | 2x |
 | Flat | 10x |
 | Total exposure | ~2h57m |
In a clear night I recorded this image of “Messier 100” – a spiral galaxy located within the southern part of constellation Coma Berenices – from Los Llanos de Aridane on La Palma. It is an LRGB composite consisting of 11 luminance frames a 600 seconds and 9 red, green and blue frames a 150 seconds respectively. The image is also available in full resolution.
The seeing conditions tonight were perfect (seeing ~1.95″) and there was no local wind. The annotated image shows a lot of other interesting objects like NGC4323, IC783, NGC4312 and NGC4328 beside M100. Some objects I was not able to assign, yet – those are marked with question marks and could be additional galaxies.
Clear skies!
Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 12:52 pm
Recently I took this image of the Great Orion Nebula from La Palma / Spain. Actually it was just a test of my equipment. I did not align the mount and hence the guiding was miserable. I only took some frames with the IR filter with different exposure times. Still, in the end the result was much better than I expected. I love the La Palma sky! 🙂 The image is also available in full resolution here.
| Date | 2017/02/02 |
| Location | La Palma / Spain |
| Object | The Great Orion Nebula |
| Camera | Atik383L+ |
| Guiding | yes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG |
| Telescope | 8" GSO Newtonian |
| Barlow lens | none |
| Mount | EQ6Syntrek |
| Cooling | 0°C |
| Luminance | 4x 5s, 7x 15s, 9x 75s, 7x 150s, 5x 300s, 2x 600s, all bin: 1x1 |
| Red | - |
| Green | - |
| Blue | - |
| Dark | - |
| Flat | 10x |
| Total exposure | ~1h15m |
Clear skies!
Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 13:20 pm
Last night I took my first astro picture with my own equipment from La Palma. My object of desire was reflection nebula Messier 78 in the constellation Orion.
After quite some unsuccessful attempts in the past days and nights (because of some technical problems, strong wind and clouds) this was a very big moment for me, and I am proud to show my first result here 🙂
| Date | 2016/12/05 |
| Location | La Palma / Spain |
| Object | Messier 78 (reflection nebula) |
| Camera | Atik383L+ |
| Guiding | yes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG |
| Telescope | 8" GSO Newtonian |
| Barlow lens | none |
| Mount | EQ6Syntrek |
| Cooling | -15°C |
| Luminance | 9x, 600s, bin: 1x1 |
| Red | 10x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Green | 10x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Blue | 10x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Dark | 2x |
| Flat | 10x |
| Total exposure | ~1h55m |
The image is also available in full resolution here. I decided to put this image into my “Top Astro-Pics Gallery”.
Clear skies!
Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 13:25 pm
36 million light years away – or 8.700.000.000 trips around the world! That’s the approximate distance to the Sunflower Galaxy which also has the boring acronym M63.
Tonight I decided to point my 8″ Newton telescope to this object to have a closer look. Even if I only had 2 hours of time I am still satisfied with the result. Personally, I think a sunflower looks a little different – anyway I like the shape and the structure of this object. M63 is located in constellation Canes Venatici and is not “so far” away from M51. Its apparent magnitude is about 9.3mag. Besides, I already targeted M63 a few years ago, but this new result I think is much better.
| Date | 2016/05/02 |
| Location | Böblingen / Germany |
| Object | Sunflower Galaxy (M63) |
| Camera | Atik383L+ |
| Guiding | yes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG |
| Telescope | 8" GSO Newtonian |
| Barlow lens | none |
| Mount | EQ6Syntrek |
| Cooling | -15°C |
| Luminance | 4x, 600s, bin: 1x1 |
| Red | 4x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Green | 4x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Blue | 4x, 150s, bin: 2x2 |
| Dark | 2x |
| Flat | 10x |
| Total exposure | ~1h10min. |
Clear skies!
Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 14:09 pm