Cosmic Island Galaxy NGC 210
23-Nov-2023
NGC 210 is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Cetus, situated roughly 70 million light-years from Earth. In this photograph, the galaxy's grand design is evident, with its pronounced spiral arms and central bulge standing out amidst a sea of stars. The spiral arms, speckled with regions of star formation, trace out from the bright core, while dark lanes of interstellar dust crisscross the galaxy, adding depth and contrast to the scene.
Captured against the deep black of space, NGC 210 appears as a solitary cosmic whirlpool, its structure highlighting the processes of galactic evolution. The surrounding field is sprinkled with other distant galaxies and stars, but NGC 210 commands the focus, a testament to the galaxy's inherent beauty and the captivating nature of astrophotography.
Image:
- 66x 300s Luminance
- 22x 300s Red
- 17x 300s Green
- 35x 300s Blue
Total integration 11 hours 40 minutes. Focal length: 2800mm
Hardware:
- Celestron 11" EdgeHD
- Skywatcher EQ8 Pro mount
- QSI 683-ws8 Camera @ -15°C
- Astrodon LRGB Gen2 E-Series Tru-Balance filters
- Starlight Xpress Lodestar X2 Autoguider
- Starlight Xpress Large Format Active Optics
- Innovations Foresight ONAG
- Starlight Instruments Feather Touch Focuser
Location:
- Exposed over 5 nights between 4th September to 16th September 2021
- Orange zone in Brisbane, Australia. (Bortle 7)
Software:
- Planning & camera alignment with Aladin 10
- Captured with TheSkyX Professional
- Guiding with PHD2
- PixInsight: Calibrate, align, integrate, dynamic background extraction, LRGB combination, noise reduction, spectrographic photometric color calibration, HDR multiscale transform, histogram, curves, crop.