Starship Asterisk*

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Please post your images here for October 9-11.

If you need instructions on posting images, please see this thread.

Thank you!
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<- Previous submissions


M27: The Dumbbell Nebula in Vulpecula
http://www.robgendlerastropics.com/M27-BYU.html
Copyright and credit: Image acquisition: Michael Joner and David Laney (BYU); image processing: Robert Gendler Cheshire Moon
http://www.galacticimages.com
Copyright: John Chumack
[attachment=0]_MG_2284chesireMoon.jpg[/attachment][/i]


<- Previous submissions

IC 5146 nebulae
http://manhattan.pagesperso-orange.fr/astro/astro.htm
Copyright: Olivier GARDE

Tarantula's Prey: the evaporating Cirrus of 30 Doradus
http://hubble-unseen.at.tf
Copyright: Nikolaus Sulzenauer, Data: HST/NASA/ESA Larger image + short description: http://quarks.maynau.com/nova/ext/n2070-viewmode.shtml

Autumn Lake Galaxy
http://www.flickr.com/photos/43894176@N07/5064282494/
Copyright: Masahiro Miyasaka

Comet Hartley and the double cluster
Copyright: Achim Schaller & Ulrich Schüly

The Dusty Pleiades
http://hwilson.zenfolio.com/opencluster ... c#h19c23fc
Copyright: Hunter Wilson

That's an extremely beautiful "galaxy landscape", Masahiro Miyasaka. The colors are fantastic, with the red and green autumn leaves dramatically contrasting with the brilliant blue color of bright A-type stars Vega and Altair. I think we are seeing the reflection of the Teapot in Sagittarius in the lake.

Ann

That's a fascinating image of Comet Hartley and the Double Cluster, Achim Schaller and Ulrich Schüly. The bright blue star just above the comet in your picture would appear to be V554 Per, also known as 10 Per or HD 14818. This is a distant B2Ia blue supergiant, whose apparent, reddened B-V index is about +0.25. It is interesting that the star nevertheless looks definitely bluer than the green coma of the comet in your picture. Tell me, did you get by these colors "honestly", or did you tweak the colors a bit to get what you expected were the right hues? Forgive me for asking, but I think I have seen some evidence of such "tweaking" in some other astroimages.

But if you haven't "cheated" at all, then I think that the contrasting colors of V554 Per and Comet Hartley are truly hugely interesting!

Ann

Hello everybody,

Here is a 360 degree panorama of the Paranal observatory platform with its 8 telescopes working below the Milky Way arch during a dark night. Apart from the Milky Way, several other galaxies are visible SMC, LMC, M31, M33 ... the Gegenschein is also visible.

I was not 100% sure, but it looks like the zodiacal light is visible as well, crossing the Milky Way vertically at the left of the middle of the picture.
Zoomable image, annotated image and more information here :
http://www.astrosurf.com/sguisard/Pagim ... _pano.html

Cheers,

Stéphane Guisard

PS:10/11/10 : I confirm that we see the zodiacal light crossing the Milky Way.

That's a fantastic image, Stéphane Guisard! I can't remember that I have seen the Andromeda Galaxy and the Magellanic Clouds in the same picture before. It's fantastic to be able to compare the relative size and surface brightness of these objects! And tiny M33 looks so small that you can hardly find it. But for all of that the Triangulum Galaxy is larger than both of the Clouds of Magellan!

I'm too lazy to google Gegenschein, but I would assume that the Gegenshein is the faint blue light that appers to stretch from the Andromeda galaxy down to that yellowness on the horizon... would that be the Moon? Surely it isn't the Sun? Could it be a town in the distance?

As for the zodiacal light, your guess is as good as mine!

I love how you have "anchored" the Milky Way with the help of those telescopes, which together create a landscape so weird that I would call it a "telescopescape"!

The appearance of the Milky Way is fascinating, too. I love that the North America Nebula is so very visible at far right, along with the Gamma Cygni nebulosity. I also love that NGC 6231 and adjacent nebulosity is so visible. And it isn't hard to see the Lagoon Nebula, the Eagle Nebula and the Omega Nebula, as well as M24, the extended blue "star cloud" in Sagittarius. It is interesting to see all the non-starforming brown dust "stretching across the middle two telescopes", so to speak! And I think Vega may be peeking out between two telescopes!

All in all, this is a truly delightful image!

Ann

Hi Ann,
I did not tweak the colors, maybe DeepSkyStacker did (align RGB-Channels) or the plugin "GradientXTerminator (balance background color).
Clear skies, Achim

http://macrosphaere.blogspot.com/

Comet 103P/Hartley
Copyright: G. Petur Nielsen
http://astro.bsd.is/cometss.html

Hello everybody,

I'd like to show you this picture of the Milky Way Center over a cloudy caldera which is lit by the small town Los Llanos on La Palma.
The picture was taken on the 7th of September at an altitude of 2400m near the Gran Telescopio Canarias. Albeit the scenic view over the mountains, I think the picture shows the light pollution nicely and I find it impressive, that astronomers are able to work under such conditions. I think the lights in the background show the island La Gomera, about 100km in the distance.

Picture taken by myself on a simple tripod, stacked 6 shots á 20 secs.
I hope this tag works, else you can find this picture, also higher resolution on http://www.flickr.com/photos/sjohnke/49 ... 847160431/


Greetings, Sebastian

sjohnke wrote:Hello everybody,

I'd like to show you this picture of the Milky Way Center over a cloudy caldera which is lit by the small town Los Llanos on La Palma.
The picture was taken on the 7th of September at an altitude of 2400m near the Gran Telescopio Canarias. Albeit the scenic view over the mountains, I think the picture shows the light pollution nicely and I find it impressive, that astronomers are able to work under such conditions. I think the lights in the background show the island La Gomera, about 100km in the distance.

Picture taken by myself on a simple tripod, stacked 6 shots á 20 secs.

Click to view full size image

I hope this tag works, else you can find this picture, also higher resolution on http://www.flickr.com/photos/sjohnke/49 ... 847160431/


Greetings, Sebastian

Great image


It looks like a Finger on The Hand of Creation has just electrified the primordial soup to spring forth life.

IC 405/410
http://www.alsonwongastro.com/ic405-.htm
Copyright: Alson Wong

Pleiades and surrounding dust
htto://andreatosatto.com
Copyright: Andrea Tosatto Taken Saturday night from Emberger Alm in ITT 2010 event with DSLR and Takahashi FS60, about 3 hours exposure. It is the best sky I ever seen .

Bye