NGC 2903 is a beautiful, barred spiral galaxy located in the constellation Leo, approximately 30 million light-years away from Earth. It is known for its dust lanes and blue regions of newly formed stars. The core region features “hot spots” that are actually newly formed globular clusters.
An odd fact about this galaxy is its dual identification. It is also cataloged as NGC 2905. This is a rare duplication of a New General Catalog entry.
Imaged with the RC8 scope at 1625mm, 071MC osc camera, and the Eq6r Pro mount.
NGC 3718 is also known as ARP 214. It is a distorted spiral galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major. It is located about 59 Million Light Years away. Its distorted form is due to gravitational interaction with the other galaxy seen in this image, NGC 3729. This interaction happened at some point in the distant past. These are all part of a group of galaxies known as the Ursa Major Cluster.
One interesting footnote – below NGC 3718 you can see a small grouping of elongated shapes, very close together. While not shown very well in my image, this is a small group of 5 galaxies known as Hickson 56. These Galaxies are estimated to be about 400 Million Light Years away!
NGC 4565 / Caldwell 38 is an edge-on spiral galaxy. It is about 30 to 50 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. It lies close to the North Galactic Pole and has a visual magnitude of approximately 10. It is known as the Needle Galaxy for its narrow profile.
The astrobin link annotates several other objects in the image.
This image consists of 169 3 minute exposures captured over two nights in Feb 2025. A GSO RC8 paired with the ASI071MC Pro was used atop a SW Eq6r Pro.
Session management by Astro Photography Tool (APT 4.60). These exposures were manually calibrated, aligned, integrated and processed in PixInsight 1.92
This image centers on a three galaxies in the Leo Constellation.
They are NGC 3384, M 105, and NGC 3389. A lesser player to the left is IC 642, it’s tiny. Annotated astrobin link.
NGC 3384 is a lenticular galaxy in the constellation Leo, about 35 million light-years away.
Messier 105 or M 105, also known as NGC 3379, is an elliptical galaxy 36.6 million light-years away in the equatorial constellation of Leo. It is the biggest elliptical galaxy in the Messier catalogue that is not in the Virgo cluster.
NGC 3389, a spiral galaxy in Leo. While not large I did manage to get some detail of this galaxy.
Messier 108 is also known as NGC 3556 and nicknamed the Surfboard Galaxy. It is a barred spiral galaxy about 46 million light-years away from Earth. It resides in the northern constellation Ursa Major. It is called the Surfboard galaxy because when viewed with a telescope, it is seen nearly edge-on. There is no apparent bulge or pronounced core.
This image consists of 89 180″ exposures taken from my driveway. It was captured with a GSO RC8 telescope f/8 @1625mm. The telescope is paired with a ZWO ASI071MC pro camera cooled to 15f. The setup is atop a Skywatcher Eq6r Pro mount. Image acquisition session management via Astro Photography Tool (APT 4.60). Image calibrated, registered, integrated and processed manually with PixInsight. Astrobin view here.
Messier 99 is a grand design spiral galaxy, completely unbarred and with two giant spiral arms. One of the spiral arms is normal and the other appears distorted. M99 is slightly asymmetric in shape. The nucleus is shifted from the galaxy’s center. This is likely due to interactions with other galaxies in the Virgo Cluster.
This galaxy seems to be known as both the Virgo Pinwheel Galaxy and St. Catherine’s Wheel. It is located in the northern constellation Coma Berenices, approximately 49,000,000 light-years from the Milky Way. That’s 49 million times 5.8 trillion miles away.
I imaged this over two nights from my driveway in January 2025. I used an RC8 with an ASI071MC camera atop a Skywatcher Eq6r Pro mount. It consists of 128 180″ exposures calibrated, integrated and processed manually using PixInsight.
A barred spiral galaxy about 50 million light-years away, and located in the constellation Ursa Major. I found this to be bright, small, and colorful. At 1625mm fl with the RC8 it still looks small. Session management with Astrophotography Tool (APT); processing in PixInsight.
Messier 100 (also known as NGC 4321 or the Blow Dryer Galaxy) is a grand design intermediate spiral galaxy. It is located in the southern part of the mildly northern Coma Berenices. It is one of the brightest galaxies in the Virgo Cluster. It is also one of the largest. The galaxy is approximately 55 million light-years from our galaxy.
It was one of the first spiral galaxies to be discovered. Lord William Parsons of Rosse listed it as one of fourteen spiral nebulae in 1850. NGC 4323 and NGC 4328 are satellite galaxies of M100. NGC 4323 is connected to M100 by a bridge of luminous matter.
Messier 100 is considered a starburst galaxy. The strongest star formation activity is concentrated in its center. This occurs within a ring, which is actually two tightly wound spiral arms. These are attached to a small nuclear bar with a radius of one thousand parsecs. Star formation has been taking place here for at least 500 million years in separate bursts.
As usual on spiral galaxies of the Virgo Cluster, the rest of the disk shows truncated star formation. It also contains neutral hydrogen. M100 is deficient in these elements compared to isolated spiral galaxies of similar Hubble type. This truncation is caused by interactions with the intracluster medium of Virgo.
This image was captured from my driveway in the hills of North Carolina in Bortle 4ish skies. It consists of 192 240″ exposures through an RC8 scope paired with an ASI071MC camera atop an Eq6r Pro mount. Image session management with APT 4.60 and processed manually in PixInsight.
A bright moon and gusty winds didn’t deter the creation of this image. Poor seeing, operator error, and clouds for a couple of hours also didn’t stop it. This is most likely my last image of 2024. The forecast for clear nights after the full moon passes doesn’t look promising.
I present my version of the “Dusty Hand Galaxy.” Also known as NGC 2146, it is a barred spiral galaxy in the constellation Camelopardalis. It is unique due to the dusty spiral arm that is looping the core from our perspective. Potentially the result of a galaxy merge at its end stage. A result is intense star formation, to such an extent that NGC 2146 is referred to as a starburst galaxy. This is a common state for barred spirals. However, the extra gravitational disruption that NGC 2146 is enduring no doubt exacerbates the situation. This compression of hydrogen-rich nebulas triggers stellar birth.
Image acquisition via Astro Photography Tool (APT), processing with Pixinsight. RC8 telescope, ASI071MC camera, & Eq6r Pro mount.
Messier 74, The Phantom Galaxy, is a large spiral galaxy in the equatorial constellation Pisces. It is about 32 million light-years away from Earth. The galaxy contains two clearly defined spiral arms. Therefore, it is used as an archetypal example of a grand design spiral galaxy. It is estimated that there are 100 billion stars in M 74.
The galaxy’s low surface brightness makes it the most difficult Messier object for amateur astronomers to observe. This difficulty gives rise to its nickname, Phantom. M74 has two spiral arms that wind counterclockwise from the galaxy’s center. The spiral arms widen as they get farther from M74’s center, but one of the arms narrows at the end.
This image was taken over two nights, on November 29th and December 3rd, 2024. I used a GSO RC8 telescope at 1625mm. An ASI071MC Pro camera was aboard a Skywatcher EQ6r Pro Mount. Acquisition session management by APT, image processing using Pixinsight.
