M13 - The Great Hercules Star Cluster
and a hundred galaxies
Orion 8" f/4 Astrograph

Uploaded 6/4/19



 


            
 There are
            few objects in the summer sky that demand more attention than
            this object, after all - its bright, rich with stars and easy
            to locate. However if we look more in depth, we find that this
            cluster is in the middle of a sea of faint galaxies, so many
            in fact that merely identifying them is a challenge! Fortunately,
            Cartes du Ciel star atlas has galaxies down to 20th magnitude
            and fainter making limiting magnitude identifications more simplified.


            
The eight inch
            f/3.9 Orion Astrograph under our very dark Happy Jack skies was
            able to record 19th magnitude galaxies without too much effort.
            The sky was starting to fill with fire smoke that night from
            a nearby forest fire, however it was fairly dark at 21.65 magnitude
            per square arc second as measured by our sky meter. Here I present
            to you three images. First the normally processed shot showing
            the lovely cluster floating in a dim star field. Second, Ive
            overlaid the star atlas to show the hordes of faint galaxies
            in this field. Finally, a few selected galaxies are shown in
            this photo key.


 

            
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a larger view:

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Select an image size for 
a larger view:

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Select an image size for 
a larger view:

1600 x 1200





Optics:  8" f/3.9 Newtonian Astrograph w/Baader MPCC Coma Corrector
Platform:  Homemade GEM with Byers Starmaster Drive 
Camera:  Hutech Modified Canon XTi @ ISO800
Exposure:  3x 5m
Location:  Happy Jack, Arizona
Elevation:  6850 ft.
Sky:  Seeing  8/10, Transparency 6/10
Outside Temperature:  45F
Processing Tools:  Photoshop CS2, Images Plus 3.82
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