Sombrero Galaxy
25-Apr-2019
The Sombrero Galaxy (also known as Messier Object 104, M104 or NGC 4594) is a lenticular galaxy in the constellation Virgo found 31 million light-years from Earth.
The galaxy has a diameter of approximately 50,000 light-years, 30% the size of the Milky Way. It has a bright nucleus, an unusually large central bulge, and a prominent dust lane in its inclined disk. The dark dust lane and the bulge give this galaxy the appearance of a sombrero hat. Source: Wikipedia
Image:
- 41x 300s Luminance
- 41x 300s Red
- 38x 300s Green
- 42x 300s Blue
Total integration 13.5 hours.
Hardware:
- Celestron 11" EdgeHD
- Skywatcher EQ8 Pro mount
- QSI 683-ws8 Camera @ -15°C
- Astronomik Luminance, Deep Sky RGB filters
- Starlight Xpress Lodestar X2 Autoguider
- Starlight Xpress Active Optics
- Innovations Foresight On Axis Guider
- Starlight Instruments Focus Boss II
Location:
- Exposed during 4 nights between 1st April and 7th April 2019.
- Orange zone in Brisbane, Australia. (Bortle 7)
Software:
- Planning & camera alignment with Aladin 10
- Captured with TheSkyX Professional
- Guiding with PHD2
- FocusLock live focusing
- PixInsight: Calibrate, align, stack, deconvolution, noise reduction, LRGB combination, histogram stretch, curves, HD multiscale transform.
- Photoshop CC: Saturation, high pass filter.