Starship Asterisk*

I remember admiring the work of Tony Hallas & Daphne Mount in US astronomy magazines in the '80s & '90s. In those days they were using modestly sized but high quality apochromatic refractors & long exposures on hypered film.

I notice on their website that these days they are "all digital". Is this APOD a digital image? If so, digital imagery has advanced enormously in a fairly short span of time.

I too have admired the work of Tony and Daphne over the years. It has been the very best possible with modest amature equipment (OK, the best amature equipment). As you can see from this image, the detail even rivals that obtained from some professional observatories.

According to the link here: http://astrophoto.com/M31.htm This digital composite image was acquired using three telescopes, a 14.5 inch a 6 inch and a 4 inch and combined exposures totalling well over 100 hours with individual exposures ranging 5 to 8 hours each! (Not to mention the countless hours of processing the image.)

This is incredible dedication beyond comprehension. My hat is off to you!

I wish I lived in a dark enough area that I could look up and see some of the wonders at night from my back yard like the Andromeda galaxy. I can barely pick up the Milky way; although I can see many constellations.
Orin

I'm definitely taking my binoculars with me when I go to visit my parents out of town this weekend. I've actually never gone looking for any of the Messier objects, so weather permitting, I'm going to try for Andromeda.

It's kind of weird to think that just 80 years ago we didn't believe the "sprial nebula" Andromeda and all the others were completely separate galaxies. Hubble and his contemporaries really changed out view of the universe more than most people realize.

Does anyone know if the apparent perturbations in the Andromeda Galactic Plane are actually there or artifact of the stitching process. The plane appears to dip under M31 and there are various slight hills and valleys farther out from that point toward the right side of the image.

Also in this large scale image there appears to be some dust ringing within M110 as well

Congratulations to Tony on a fine, fine image, and thanks to Robert and Jerry for showing it to all as an APOD. I was lucky enough to see a preview of it in a private message from Tony, and I knew immediately that it was APOD material.

What I like most about it is the clear visualization of the incredibly dim and diffuse outer arms, as well as the dust spirals toward the central core. These really highlight the spiral nature of the galaxy as well as clearly presenting how very large the galaxy really is in the sky!

Tony's image accurately portrays the overall shape of the galaxy, which doesn't appear perfectly flat. It's really like that; it's not a stitching artifact.

I encourage everyone to take their binoculars out and try to see M31. From most locations you may see only just the bright fuzzy blob that is the core, but it's amazing to think that the light has traveled for millions of years to find its way into your eyes!

-Noel

I enjoyed the link to the Shapley Curtis debate. It is interesting that both were wrong and right at the same time.

Absolutely stunning and awe inspiring photo. It would be interesting to have the photo edited [ foreground stars removed] and view Andromeda in it's inter galicitic purity.

When I was a kid growing up in North Dakota, we could see Andromeda Galaxy naked eye. It was just a faint fuzzy patch overhead. Now there's too much light pollution even there.