View allAll Photos Tagged LargeMagellanicCloud
This is the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy close to our own.
The green nebula is the Tarantula Nebula.
There are many other star clusters and nebulae in this photo, too many to mention!
Shot taken with StwenBoy (www.flickr.com/photos/26323573@N04/) in Buninyong.
Taken with a Canon 70D at 250mm and a SkyWatcher Star Adventurer.
Sitting atop Cerro Paranal high above the Atacama Desert in Chile, two of the Very Large Telescope's Unit Telescopes quietly bask in the starlight, observing the Milky Way as it arches over ESO's Paranal Observatory.
More information: www.eso.org/public/images/potw1439a/
Credit:
ESO/Y. Beletsky
The area is rich in Integrated Flux Nebulae. A part of Gum Nebula is visible red near the left upper corner. Stars trailed near the left lower corner due to differential atmospheric refraction near the horizon.
Integrated Flux Nebulae are visible clearer in inverted frame.
Large Magellanic Cloud and Integrated Flux Nebulae Nearby with Sigma 85mmF1.4 Art December 2016 Inverted Version:
www.flickr.com/photos/hiroc/37527361541
The Magellanic Clouds are connected with stellar streams, the brightest parts of which are known as wing and tail of SMC. The MCs are also accompanied by long Hydrogen-I gas stream extending more than 100 degrees.
equipment: Sigma 40mmF1.4 Art and EOS 6D-SP4, modified by Seo-san on ZWO AM5 equatorial mount on the genuine tripod with counter weight 4.8kg, autoguided with Fujinon 1:2.8/75mm C-Mount Lens, ZWO ASI 120MM-mini, and PHD2 Guiding
exposure: 3 times x 900 seconds, 3 x 240 sec, 5 x 60, and 1 x 15 seconds at ISO 1,600 and f/3.2
site: 2,434m above sea level at lat. 24 39 52 south and long. 70 16 11 west near Cerro Armazones in Sierra Vicuña Mackenna in Coast Range of Chile
Ambient temperature was around 10 degrees Celsius or 34 degrees Fahrenheit. Wind was mild. Sky was dark, and SQML reached 21.83 at the night.
When I took a look at the sky, I thought that my plan for some astrophotography might be a washout due to the bands of high cloud. Still, it is always better to give it a try than to walk away. The results were surprisingly good in this case, and well worth the effort.
This image features the neighboring apartment block and the crown of a eucalyptus tree in the foreground. The Milky Way is aligned straight up and down in the centre. The Galactic Core was below the horizon. The Pointers, Coalsack Dark Nebula, Southern Cross, and Carina Constellation are prominent along the Milky Way. The Large Magellanic Cloud is clearly visible as a smudge of light towards the upper right corner. The bands of clouds running diagonally from lower right to upper left produced an interesting complement to the Milky Way (in my opinion).
This image was a bit fiddly to produce, but I am getting more proficient at the workflow. I aligned and stacked 10 input photographs. I then optimized the lighting of the sky region, and the lighting of one of the input photographs for the foreground objects. These two images were then blended into a single image that was optimized for the different properties of both the foreground and background elements.
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Links for background information ...
amazingsky.net/2017/05/03/the-amazing-sky-of-carina-and-c...
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[ Location - Barton, Australian Capital Territory, Australia ]
Photography notes ...
The photographs were taken using the following hardware configuration ...
(Year of manufacture indicated in braces where known.)
- Hasselblad 501CM Body (Chrome) - S/N 10SH26953 (2002).
- Hasselblad CFV-50c Digital Back for Hasselblad V mount camera.
- Hasselblad Focusing Screen for the CFV-50c digital back, with focussing prism and crop markings.
- Hasselblad 45 Degree Viewfinder PME-45 42297 (2001).
- Hasselblad Carl Zeiss fisheye lens - F-Distagon 3.5/30 CF T* (1996).
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) TFC-14 Series 1 Carbon Fiber Tripod - MFR # 13996.
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) BH-30 Ball Head with Mini Screw-Knob Clamp - MFR # BH-30 PRO.
- Hasselblad HATQCH (3043326) Tripod Quick Coupling.
- Arca-Swiss ARUCP38 Universal Camera Plate 3/8”.
- Nikon AR-3 Shutter Release Cable.
- Artisan & Artist ACAM-302 Silk Cord for Hassleblad Cameras (Black).
To minimise the incidence of vibrations, I employed the following strategies :
a. Use of a sturdy tripod.
b. Pre-exposure mirror lock-up.
c. A mechanical shutter release cable.
I acquired the 10 input photographs (8272 x 6200 pixels) with an ISO of 3200, exposure time of 8 seconds, and aperture of f/3.5.
Post-processing ...
Finder - Removed the CF card from the camera digital back and placed it in a Lexar 25-in-1 USB card reader. Then used Finder on my MacBook Air to download the raw image files (3FR extension) from the card.
Lightroom - Imported the 3FR images.
Lightroom - Exported the images as 16-bit TIFF files.
StarryLandscapeStacker - Loaded the TIFF files.
StarryLandscapeStacker - Adjusted the automatically derived stars and sky region. Stacked the images, making adjustments for the rotation and translation of the stars from one frame to the next. Output the result as a TIFF file. Also saved the Foreground/Sky mask image.
Lightroom - Imported the stacked TIFF image.
Lightroom - Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header.
Lightroom - Applied various basic lighting and color adjustments in the Develop module to optimize the lighting of the sky region.
Lightroom - Saved the Develop module settings as a preset.
Lightroom - Output the image as a TIFF image (8272 x 6200 pixels).
Lightroom - Imported one of the original photographs.
Lightroom - Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header.
Lightroom - Applied various basic lighting and color adjustments in the Develop module to optimize the lighting of the foreground region.
Lightroom - Saved the Develop module settings as a preset.
Lightroom - Output the image as a TIFF image (8272 x 6200 pixels).
Photoshop - Imported the two images output from Lightroom, and the mask produced by StarryLandscapeStacker.
Photoshop - Blended the foreground and sky regions of the two optimized images using the mask file, Normal blend mode, 80% opacity, and a feather distance of 50 pixels.
Photoshop - Output the image as a JPEG image using the “Maximum” quality option (8272 x 6200 pixels).
PhotoSync - Copied the JPEG file to my iPad Mini for any final processing, review, enjoyment, and posting to social media.
@MomentsForZen #MomentsForZen #MFZ #Hasselblad #501CM #CFV50c #Lightroom #StarryLandscapeStacker #Photoshop #PhotoSync #Sky #Night #Dark #Stars #Clouds #Apartments #Trees #SouthernPointers #Pointers #CoalsackNebula #SouthernCross #Carina #SouthernPleiades #CarinaNebula #LargeMagellanicCloud
This is one of a pair of photographs that I took of the stars around the South Celestial Pole. The web links (URL's) for the pair are given below. This was a "point star" photograph with an 8 second exposure, whilst the other was a "star trail" photograph with a 34 minute exposure.
As far as the motivation for taking these photographs was concerned, it was almost a case of "because I could". But really, its always both more complicated and simpler than that! The results delight me, disappoint me, surprise me, astonish me, educate me, calm me, ... all at once. I even enjoy the act the taking the photographs - a consequence of the heft and the mechanical controls of my Hasselblad 500C/M camera - born well before the digital era but engineered in such a way that a modern digital back can be used in place of film.
I took a similar pair of photographs at this time of the morning from this location 3 months ago (URL's below). In this timeframe, the stars have appeared to rotate clockwise by 90 degrees. The notable features in the scene are but few when compared with the North Celestial Pole. The brightest star, towards the upper right corner, is Achernar. The smudge one third out from the centre towards 4 o'clock is the Small Magellanic Cloud, whilst the smudge on the other side of the centre towards 10 o'clock is the Large Magellanic Cloud. Both of these are galaxies, composed of dozens of nebulae and star clusters. The building is our apartment block.
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URL's for this pair of point star and star trail photographs (September 2016)...
Point star image on Flickr ...
www.flickr.com/photos/momentsforzen/29592098970/
Star trail image on Flickr ...
www.flickr.com/photos/momentsforzen/29886074935/
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URL's for a previous pair of point star and star trail photographs (June 2016) ...
Point star image on Flickr ...
www.flickr.com/photos/momentsforzen/27092362483/
Star trail image on Flickr ...
www.flickr.com/photos/momentsforzen/27424551430/
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[ Location - Barton, Australian Capital Territory, Australia ]
Photography notes ...
The photograph was taken using the following hardware configuration ...
(Year of manufacture indicated in braces where known.)
- Hasselblad 500C/M body (1994).
- Hasselblad CFV-50c Digital Back for Hasselblad V mount camera.
- Hasselblad Focusing Screen for the CFV-50c digital back, with focusing prism and crop markings.
- Hasselblad 45 Degree Viewfinder PME-45 42297 (2001).
- Hasselblad Carl Zeiss lens - Distagon 40mm f/4 CF T* FLE (1996).
- Hasselblad 93mm 1x HZ-0 Filter.
- Hasselblad 093/40 Hood/Filter holder for 40mm CF, CFE, CFi, CFE IF lenses.
I acquired the photograph (8272 x 6200 pixels) with an ISO of 1600, exposure time of 8 seconds, and aperture of f/4.0
Post-processing ...
Finder - Removed the CF card from the camera digital back and placed it in a Lexar 25-in-1 USB card reader. Then used Finder on my MacBook Air to download the raw image file (3FR extension) from the card.
Lightroom - Imported the 3FR image.
Lightroom - Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header.
Lightroom - Applied various basic lighting and color adjustments in the Develop module. The general processing objectives / strategy that I use with photographs of the night sky is as follows ...
- Adjust the geometry (e.g., perspective, straighten, crop).
- Adjust the White Balance.
- Increase the definition of features.
- Prevent the whites from becoming overexposed.
Lightroom - Specifically ...
Lightroom - In the Develop module, I applied Preset 20160923-003 that represented the settings used to process the companion star trail photograph.
Lightroom - Made various small adjustments to obtain a better lighting and color match to the companion star trail photograph.
Lightroom - Saved the Develop module settings as preset 20160923-012.
Lightroom - Output the image as a JPEG image using the "Maximum" quality option (8272 x 6200 pixels).
PhotoSync - Copied the JPEG file to my iPad Mini for any final processing, review, enjoyment, and posting to social media.
@MomentsForZen #MomentsForZen #MFZ #Hasselblad #500CM #CFV50c #Lightroom #Sky #Night #BlueHour #Stars #SouthCelestialPole #MagellanicCloud #MagellanicClouds #LargeMagellanicCloud #SmallMagellanicCloud #LMC #SMC #Achernar
Nikon d5100
Tokina 11-16mm @ 11mm
10 seconds
ISO 3200
f2.8
Slightly different angle in this one and also employed some different post processing techniques.
Editor's Note: Chandra is celebrating 10 years of operation. Another jewel from 2005 -- a cat in space!
This composite X-ray (red and green)/optical (blue) image reveals a cat-shaped image produced by the remnants of two exploded stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy. Although the shells of hot gas appear to be colliding, this may be an illusion.
Chandra X-ray spectra show that the hot gas shell on the upper left contains considerably more iron than the one on the lower right. The high abundance of iron implies that this supernova remnant is the product of a Type Ia supernova triggered by the infall of matter from a companion star onto a white dwarf star.
In contrast, the much lower abundance of iron in the lower supernova remnant indicates that it was a Type II supernova produced by the explosion of a young, massive star. It takes billions of years to form a white dwarf star, whereas a massive young star will explode in a few million years. The disparity of ages in the progenitor stars means that it is very unlikely that they exploded very close to each other. The apparent proximity of the remnants is probably the result of a chance alignment.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/U.Illinois/R.Williams & Y.-H.Chu; Optical: NOAO/CTIO/U.Illinois/R.Williams & MCELS coll.
Read more about this image:
www.chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/d316/
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
This is 16.5 hours of exposure containing the NGC nebula 2014, 2020, 2035, 2040 and the Globular cluster NGC2004.
All the more amazing that these objects are in another galaxy, the LMC, more than 158,000 light years away.
Specs for techs:
Telescope: GSO RC10 f/7
Camera: Moravian G3-11000
Filters: Baader 7nm Ha and OIII. RGB
Exposures H,O,R,G,B = 6, 6,1.5,1.5,1.5 hours
The Large Magellanic Cloud Central.
Central Region of The Large Magellanic Cloud.
Mosaic Panels: 3
Exposures per mosaic panel: R:5 hours + Ha:5 hours , B:5 hours + OIII: 5 hours (20 hours per tile, 60 hours total)
Total Field Covered: 240 x 130 arcminutes.
Dates: 12th, 13th, 22nd and 23rd November, 2nd, 3rd, 12th and 13th December 2009.
Location: Gold Coast, Queensland.
Processing:
Sub-Image calibration and per-filter colour image sigma rejected addition with CCDStack.
Background correction using the PixInsight software's Dynamic Background Extraction Tool.
Green Synthesis, RGB combination, mosaic assembly, levels and Adobe RGB 1998 colourspace conversion with Adobe Photoshop CS4.
Notes:
This image was an experiment in dealing with light pollution from my site by blending Narrowband filters with RGB and synthesizing Green, usually the most problematic colour.
Using Ha and OIII filters to limit the earthly glows and blending the flat backgrounds from these with standard Red and Blue filters.
For this particular image, being a mosaic, there is approximately 60 hours of exposures here without taking any Green or SII, which would have required another 30 hours of exposures in this case.
In an attempt to limit light pollution influences and also reduce the total amount of time needed to take all the exposures for this three-panel, pseudo RGB image, the Green channel was synthesised from the combined R = R+Ha and B= B+OIII images.
Telescope: Takahashi FSQ106ED
Focal Length: 390mm
Camera: SBIG ST10XE
Pixels: 2184 x 1472 x 6.7um
2010 Royal Observatory Greenwich -Astronomy Photographer of the Year shortlist.
30 sec, ISO 4000 | Nikon D3 + 24mm f/1.4G
Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), East of La Serena, Chile, 13 April 2011
© 2011 José Francisco Salgado, PhD
Explore #301 on 22 May 2011
To the west of the great Brandberg Massif in Namibia lies the remote Ugab River Rhino Camp, the most remote of the campsites we stayed in.
It's only accessible by a 4x4 vehicle and you pass through almost lunar landscapes to get to it, but it was worth the visit: lovely hot showers and tremendously dark skies.
Here's a shot of the campsite, with the Milky Way above the hills. You can just make out the Large Magellanic Cloud just above the horizon behind the second vehicle.
These delicate wisps of gas make up an object known as SNR B0519-69.0, or SNR 0519 for short. The thin, blood-red shells are actually the remnants from when an unstable star exploded violently as a supernova around 600 years ago. There are several types of supernovae, but for SNR 0519 the star that exploded was a white dwarf — the core of a Sun-like star in the final stages of its life.
SNR 0519 is located over 150,000 light-years from Earth in the southern constellation of Dorado (the Dolphinfish), a constellation that also contains most of our neighboring galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Because of this, this region of the sky is full of intriguing and beautiful deep-sky objects.
The LMC orbits the Milky Way Galaxy as a satellite and is the fourth largest in our group of galaxies, called the Local Group.
For more information please visit:
www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1317a/
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
Acknowledgment: Claude Cornen
QHY-10 + Apo-El-Nikkor 105mm/f5.6 (New) + SW EQ-5 SynScan Pro
13 x 20 min + 9 x 2 min
Tivoli farm, Namibia, Apr 19, 22, 2012.
The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), an irregular satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, and one of the prime attractions of the southern hemisphere sky. At left is the Tarantula Nebula, NGC 2070, while at upper right is the second brightest nebula in the LMC, NGC 1763, aka the LMC Lagoon. In between are an amazing number of nebulas, both magenta and cyan in tint, as well as clusters of stars. The LMC is 160,000 light years away, and is gravitationally bound to the Milky Way, though there is some dispute whether it is orbiting the Milky Way or is passing by.
This field is 6° x 4°, which just encompasses the majority of the LMC's structure and features.
I shot this Monday, March 24, 2014 from the Warrumbungles Mountain Motel grounds, near Coonabarabran, NSW, Australia. This is a stack of 6 x 10 minute exposures with the Borg 77mm aperture astrographic lens, a 300mm f/4 system, and the Canon 5D MkII camera, filter modified by Hutech, at ISO 800. Shots had to dodge clouds moving through during the evening. Humidity was high from rain earlier in the day. But transparency was good when skies were clear.
Thee-image panorama. The Small and Large Magellanic Clouds are to the right of SALT. South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO), Sutherland, South Africa, 20 Mar 2010.
© 2010 José Francisco Salgado, PhD
[ This relatively short exposure image has a companion long exposure star trail image - see www.flickr.com/photos/momentsforzen/27424551430/ ]
This image was taken just 2 minutes after the completion of the star trail image. It was acquired with an ISO of 1600, an exposure length of 15 seconds, and an aperture of f/4. With this exposure time, the stars have still retained point-source form. I also acquired an image using an exposure time of 30 seconds and the stars in this image were clearly beginning to appear as short star trails. It is notable that there are 3 light trails associated with satellites in the image. Also noteworthy is that relative to the image with 30 minute exposure and an ISO of 100, this image has significant background colored sensor speckle noise.
In this field of view, the brightest star, with a Brightness Magnitude of 0.5, was Achernar, in the top left of the image. After that, there was Peacock (Brightness 1.91) in the top right of the image, and Atria (Brightness 1.92) towards the lower right corner of the image, just to the left of the corner of the building facade.
The two smudges on the left hand side of the image are real astronomic objects, not just moisture clouds in the sky here on Earth! They are in fact the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, two galaxies that are amongst the closest galaxies to our Milky Way Galaxy. The elongate, diffuse light cloud near the center left edge of the image, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), is in the region of the open cluster, the Tarantula Nebula (Caldwell Catalogue object C103). The nebula itself is too dim to be readily visible because it's Brightness Magnitude is 8.2. The other light cloud, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), that is offset towards the upper left from the center of the image, is adjacent to two unnamed globular clusters - Caldwell Catalogue objects C104 (unnamed) and C106 (47 Tucanae).
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Magellanic_Cloud
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Magellanic_Cloud
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caldwell_catalogue
Barton, Australian Capital Territory, Australia.
Photography notes ...
The photograph was taken using the following hardware configuration ...
(Year of manufacture indicated in braces where known.)
- Hasselblad 500C/M body (1994).
- Hasselblad CFV-50c Digital Back for Hasselblad V mount camera.
- Hasselblad Focusing Screen for the CFV-50c digital back, with focussing prism and crop markings.
- Hasselblad 45 Degree Viewfinder PME-45 42297 (2001).
- Hasselblad Carl Zeiss lens - Distagon 40mm f4 CF T* FLE - Nr 7952446 - (1996).
- Hasselblad 93mm 1x HZ-0 Filter.
- Hasselblad 093/40 Hood/Filter holder for 40mm CF, CFE, CFi, CFE IF lenses.
I acquired the photograph (8272 x 6200 pixels) with an ISO of 1600, exposure time of 15 seconds, and aperture of f/4.
Post-processing ...
Finder - Removed the CF card from the camera digital back and placed it in a Lexar 25-in-1 USB card reader. Then used Finder on my MacBook Air to download the raw image file (3FR extension) from the card.
Lightroom - Imported the 3FR image. Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header. Then applied various adjustments in the Develop module, the essence of which is as follows (largely "borrowed" from my Develop Module Preset 20160522-001) ...
- White Balance (Temperature and Tint).
- Tone (Exposure, Contrast - Increased, Highlights and Shadows - Increased, Whites - Increased, Blacks - Decreased).
- Presence (Clarity - Increased, Vibrance - Increased, Saturation - Decreased).
- [HSL adjustments as required for selective color adjustments.]
- [Sharpening and Noise Reduction - Default values.]
- [Lens Corrections as required.] I used a lens profile for one of the Zeiss Distagon lenses to partially compensate for the dark vignette that was present around the margins of the image.
- Dehaze - Increased.
- [Graduated and Radial filters as required for local adjustments.]
I then exported the image as a JPG file with 8272 x 6200 pixels from the Library module. The Develop Module settings were saved as Preset 20160613-003.
PhotoSync - Copied the JPEG file to my iPad Mini for viewing, enjoyment and posting to social media!
Large Magellanic Cloud in the constellation Dorado. The image is a four panel mosaic, LRGB composite.
Optics: Takahashi FSQ-106ED F/5 (530mm FL)
Camera: Apogee Alta U16M
Mount: Software Bisque Paramount ME
Integrated exposure time: 18 hours
Higher resolutions are available - cosmicphotos.com/gallery/image.php?fld_image_id=218&f...
With the prospect of reduced light pollution, I was looking forward to photographing the night sky when visiting the town of Corowa. Unfortunately, the near full waxing gibbous Moon put paid to dark skies. What can you do? Take the shot anyway.
This is a 34 minute star-trail long-exposure showing the apparent rotation around the South Celestial Pole. Along the bottom is the typical Australian suburban backyard. The Moon was just out of frame top right. The saint smudge along the top near the lefthand edge is the Small Magellanic Cloud. The Large Magellanic Cloud is the smudge centre left. The diagonal smudge heading from the centre bottom to the top right is the Milky Way, from Carina at the bottom, the Southern Cross, the Coalsack Dark Nebula, the Pointers, through to Centaurus and the start of the Great Rift.
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[ Location - Corowa, New South Wales, Australia ]
Photography notes ...
The photograph was taken using the following hardware configuration ...
(Year of manufacture indicated in braces where known.)
- Hasselblad 501CM Body (Chrome) - S/N 10SH26953 (2002).
- Hasselblad CFV-50c Digital Back for Hasselblad V mount camera (2016).
- Hasselblad Focusing Screen for the CFV-50c digital back, with focusing prism and crop markings.
- Hasselblad 45 Degree Viewfinder PME-45 42297 (2001).
- Hasselblad Carl Zeiss fisheye lens - F-Distagon 3.5/30 CF T* (1996).
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) TFC-14 Series 1 Carbon Fiber Tripod - MFR # 13996.
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) BH-30 Ball Head with Mini Screw-Knob Clamp - MFR # BH-30 PRO.
- Hasselblad HATQCH (3043326) Tripod Quick Coupling.
- Arca-Swiss ARUCP38 Universal Camera Plate 3/8”.
- Nikon AR-3 Shutter Release Cable.
- Artisan & Artist ACAM-302 Silk Cord for Hassleblad Cameras (Black).
I acquired this photograph (8272 x 6200 pixels) with an ISO of 100, exposure time of 34:08 seconds (20170930 @ 21:42:23 to 22:16:31), and aperture of f/11.0
Post-processing ...
Finder - Removed the CF card from the camera digital back and placed it in a Lexar 25-in-1 USB card reader. Then used Finder on my MacBook Air to download the raw image file (3FR extension) from the card.
Lightroom - Imported the 3FR image. Applied a standard metadata preset (20161110 Import 001) during the import process.
Lightroom - Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header.
Lightroom - Used the Spot Removal tool (Clone mode) to attenuate a number of sensor dust spots.
Lightroom - Made various lighting and color adjustments to the image.
Lightroom - Straightened the image then applied a crop, retaining the original 4:3 aspect ratio.
Lightroom - Saved the Develop module settings as a preset.
Lightroom - Output the image as a JPEG image using the “Maximum” quality option (7632 x 5720 pixels).
PhotoSync - Copied the JPEG file to my iPad Mini for any final processing, review, enjoyment, and posting to social media.
@MomentsForZen #MomentsForZen #MFZ #Hasselblad #501CM #CFV50c #Lightroom #Night #NightSky #LongExposure #Sky #FisheyeLens #WideAngleLens #Backyard #Stars #MilkyWay #LargeMagellanicCloud #SmallMagellanicCloud #LMC #SMC #Pointers #SouthernPointers #SouthernCross #Crux #AlphaCentauri #BetaCentauri #Hadar #Coalsack #CoalsackNebula #JewelBox #OmegaCentauri #EtaCarinae #StarTrails #LightTrails #GreatRift #Centaurus #SouthCelestialPole
A 4-panel mosaic of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way and visible only from the southern hemisphere. The field takes in most of the LMC and its numerous nebulas and clusters. Notable is the Tarantula Nebula, NGC 2070, the cyan-tinted nebula at far left, surrounded by many other NGC nebulas and clusters. At right is the second largest and brightest nebula complex in the LMC, NGC 1763, dubbed the LMC Lagoon.
This is a 4-panel mosaic taken March 31, 2016 from the Tibuc Cottage, Coonabarabran, NSW, Australia. Each panel is a stack of 4 x 3 minute exposures with the Borg 77mm f/4 astrographic refractor and filter-modified Canon 5D MkII at ISO 1600. Stitched in Photoshop.
This time lapse was shot with the camera mounted on a Vixen Polarie Star Tracker, which eliminated the stars' movement over the entire duration of the session. It was very windy that night.
This image from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope reveals a vibrant nebula far from Earth. Its colors, produced by the light emitted by oxygen and hydrogen, help astronomers investigate the star-forming processes in nebulae such as NGC 2080.
Nicknamed the Ghost Head Nebula, NGC 2080 is part of a chain of star-forming regions south of the 30 Doradus nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud that have attracted special attention. These regions have been studied in detail with Hubble and have long been identified as unique star-forming sites. 30 Doradus is the largest star-forming complex in the whole Local Group of galaxies.
The light from the nebula captured in this image is emitted by two elements, hydrogen and oxygen. The red and the blue light are from regions of hydrogen gas heated by nearby stars. The green light on the left comes from glowing oxygen, energized by a powerful stellar wind (a stream of high-speed particles) coming from a massive star just outside the image. The white region in the center is a combination of all three emissions and indicates a core of hot, massive stars in this star-formation region. The intense emission from these stars has carved a bowl-shaped cavity in the surrounding gas.
In the white region, the two bright areas (the "eyes of the ghost"), named A1 (left) and A2 (right), are very hot, glowing "blobs" of hydrogen and oxygen. The bubble in A1 is produced by the hot, intense radiation and powerful stellar wind from a single massive star. A2 has a more complex appearance due to the presence of more dust, and it contains several hidden, massive stars. The massive stars in A1 and A2 must have formed within the last 10,000 years, since their natal gas shrouds are not yet disrupted by the powerful radiation of the newly born stars.
The research team noted that Hubble's superb resolution is essential to see the various features in the nebula and to better understand the formation of massive stars in this interesting region.
This picture is composed of three images obtained on March 28, 2000, with Hubble's Wide Field Planetary Camera 2. The colors are red (ionized hydrogen), green (ionized oxygen), and blue (ionized hydrogen). The image spans 67 x 67 arcseconds, corresponding to 55 x 55 light-years at the distance of the Large Magellanic Cloud (168,000 light-years).
For more information please visit:
hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/2001/34/1118-Image.html
Credit: NASA, ESA & Mohammad Heydari-Malayeri (Observatoire de Paris, France)
Description: Chandra's image of SNR 0540-69.3 reveals two aspects of the enormous power released when a massive star explodes. An implosion crushed material into an extremely dense (10 miles in diameter) neutron star, triggering an explosion that sent a shock wave rumbling through space at speeds in excess of 5 million miles per hour. The central intense white blaze of high-energy particles about 3 light years across was created by a rapidly rotating neutron star, or pulsar. Surrounding the white blaze is a shell of hot gas 40 light years in diameter that marks the location of the supernova shock wave. The colors red, green and blue in the image correspond to low, medium and high-energy X-rays, respectively.
Creator/Photographer: Chandra X-ray Observatory
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, which was launched and deployed by Space Shuttle Columbia on July 23, 1999, is the most sophisticated X-ray observatory built to date. The mirrors on Chandra are the largest, most precisely shaped and aligned, and smoothest mirrors ever constructed. Chandra is helping scientists better understand the hot, turbulent regions of space and answer fundamental questions about origin, evolution, and destiny of the Universe. The images Chandra makes are twenty-five times sharper than the best previous X-ray telescope. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra science and flight operations from the Chandra X-ray Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Medium: Chandra telescope x-ray
Date: 2004
Persistent URL: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2004/snr0540/
Repository: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Gift line: NASA/CXC/SAO
Accession number: snr0540_xray
In the most active starburst region in the local universe lies a cluster of brilliant, massive stars, known to astronomers as Hodge 301.
Hodge 301, seen in the lower right corner of this image, lives inside the Tarantula Nebula within our galactic neighbor the Large Magellanic Cloud.
Many of the stars in Hodge 301 are so old that they have exploded as supernovae. These exploded stars are blasting material out into the surrounding region at speeds of almost 200 miles per second. This high-speed material is plowing into the surrounding Tarantula Nebula, shocking and compressing the gas into a multitude of sheets and filaments, seen in the upper left portion of the picture.
Hodge 301 contains three red supergiants — stars that are close to the end of their evolution and are about to go supernova, exploding and sending more shocks into the Tarantula.
Also present near the center of the image are small, dense gas globules and dust columns where new stars are being formed as part of the overall ongoing star formation throughout the Tarantula region.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/1999/news-1999-12.html
Credit: The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)
The Small Magellanic Cloud and Large Magellanic Cloud in the Night Sky at Blayney, Central West, NSW, Australia.
Looking at today’s date, I see that November is now just over a week away, bringing longer and hotter days to us southern hemisphere folk. In coastal areas, like where I live, those longer, hotter days mean more chance of cloudy nights. If the weather can do the right thing for me once this month’s full moon passes, I should have one more opportunity to get some Milky Way core photos for the year. After that, I’ll be looking for southern summer sky objects to photograph.
The Magellanic Clouds, the two large, fuzzy and misty blobs in the sky in my photo, are usually high on the list of summer nightscape targets. For most of where Australia’s population lives the Magellanic Clouds are visible all year round but don’t get as much photographic fame as the Milky Way’s core does. I photographed these two dwarf galaxies in early September as they seemingly hung in the air over the Norfolk Island pine trees at Tuross Head, Australia. I also captured some satellite trails at the right-hand edge of the shot, as well as a meteor trail flashing between two of the pine trees.
I created this image from two slightly overlapping single photos, which I shot with my trusty Canon EOS 6D Mk II camera, through a Rokinon 24mm lens @ f/2.4, using a 15-second exposure @ ISO 3200.
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Tarantula Nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
Original caption: Glowing brightly about 160 000 light-years away, the Tarantula Nebula is the most spectacular feature of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy to our Milky Way. This image from VLT Survey Telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile shows the region and its rich surroundings in great detail. It reveals a cosmic landscape of star clusters, glowing gas clouds and the scattered remains of supernova explosions.
Gaze up at the night sky from ESO's Paranal Observatory in Chile, and you will be greeted with a stunning view like this one. Flecks of blue, orange, red; each a different star, galaxy, nebula, or more, together forming a sparkling sky overhead. Astronomers peer at this beautiful backdrop, trying to unravel the mysteries of the Universe.
More information: www.eso.org/public/images/potw1401a/
Credit:
ESO/Y. Beletsky
The brightly glowing plumes seen in this image are reminiscent of an underwater scene, with turquoise-tinted currents and nebulous strands reaching out into the surroundings. However, this is no ocean. This image actually shows part of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a small nearby galaxy that orbits our galaxy, the Milky Way, and appears as a blurred blob in our skies. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has peeked many times into this galaxy, releasing stunning images of the whirling clouds of gas and sparkling stars (opo9944a, heic1301, potw1408a). This image shows part of the Tarantula Nebula's outskirts. This famously beautiful nebula, located within the LMC, is a frequent target for Hubble (heic1206, heic1402). In most images of the LMC the colour is completely different to that seen here. This is because, in this new image, a different set of filters was used. The customary R filter, which selects the red light, was replaced by a filter letting through the near-infrared light. In traditional images, the hydrogen gas appears pink because it shines most brightly in the red. Here however, other less prominent emission lines dominate in the blue and green filters. This data is part of the Archival Pure Parallel Project (APPP), a project that gathered together and processed over 1000 images taken using Hubble’s Wide Field Planetary Camera 2, obtained in parallel with other Hubble instruments. Much of the data in the project could be used to study a wide range of astronomical topics, including gravitational lensing and cosmic shear, exploring distant star-forming galaxies, supplementing observations in other wavelength ranges with optical data, and examining star populations from stellar heavyweights all the way down to solar-mass stars. A version of this image was entered into the Hubble’s Hidden Treasures image processing competition by contestant Josh Barrington.
Woke to find that the night sky was clear of clouds. This was opportunity that I had been waiting for - i.e., a chance to take some night sky photographs using the 30mm fisheye lens for my Hasselblad 501CM camera. This lens is the widest C-mount lens, and should be a reasonable lens for photographing in the night sky.
It was immediately obvious that the width of the view meant that the Milky Way stood out more clearly from the background as a ribbon with a high concentration of stars and an elevated brightness.
The curves of the lines in our apartment building were the most obvious sign of the fisheye geometry. I find this departure from rectilinear geometry quite attractive, and refreshing.
The scene contained a number of notable structure - e.g., ...
- The Milky Way.
- The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMG) - The small, bright region just above the top of the apartment building near the right hand edge of the image.
- The "Southern Pointers" - Alpha and Beta Centauri (a.k.a. Hadar).
- The Southern Cross (Crux)
- The Coalsack Dark Nebula.
- The Jewel Box open star cluster.
- The globular cluster Omega Centauri (NGC 5139, Caldwell C80).
- The diffuse nebula "Eta Carinae" (NGC 3372, Caldwell C92)
Overall, you couldn't have wiped the smile off my face in relation to my recent acquisition - i.e., the 30mm f/3.5 fisheye lens for my Hasselblad 501CM camera body.
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The following is a reasonably detailed statement of the post-processing that I carried out. I have included this information "for the record" and to make it easier when I need to process similar raw image captures ("photographs") in the future.
The challenges included ...
- High levels of ambient (background) light that swamps the contrast and masks the more subtle night sky features.
- The brightness of the building facade which places constraints on the changes to the maximum exposure and the enhancement of the "highlights". ***
- The "murky" brown color of the sky which made it necessary to manage a change to the "temperature" (i.e., White Balance).
[*** This aspect could be side-stepped through the use of layering and blending, but I had decided to largely stick to processing without the use of these features.]
With the above in mind, the post-processing that I carried out in Lightroom ...
- Modified the Temperature (4200K).
- Increased the Exposure and Contrast (Exposure 1.45, Contrast 100).
- Broadened the mid-tones by reducing the Highlights and Whites (-100, -100) whilst increasing the Shadows and Black (+81, +100).
- Increased the Clarity (+100) whilst decreasing the Saturation (-50).
- Applied more subtle adjustments to the Tone curve (Highlights 0, Lights -95, Darks 34, Shadows -35).
- Permitted a strong reduction in the saturation of Purple colors (Red -50, Purple -100, Magenta -50) to remove the purple mantle that surrounded the brighter stars.
- Retained the default Sharpening.
- Applied a moderate amount of Luminance noise reduction (Luminance noise reduction 35, Detail 50, Contrast 0).
- Applied Color noise reduction (Color noise reduction 75, Detail 0, Smoothness 100).
- Used the maximum amount of Dehaze filtering (100).
- Utilized several Graduated and Radial filters to apply local adjustments to the Exposure, Saturation, and Clarity / Dehaze.
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[ Location - Barton, Australian Capital Territory, Australia ]
Photography notes ...
The photograph was taken using the following hardware configuration ...
(Year of manufacture indicated in braces where known.)
- Hasselblad 501CM Body (Chrome) - S/N 10SH26953 (2002).
- Hasselblad CFV-50c Digital Back for Hasselblad V mount camera (2016).
- Hasselblad Focusing Screen for the CFV-50c digital back, with focusing prism and crop markings.
- Hasselblad 45 Degree Viewfinder PME-45 42297 (2001).
- Hasselblad Carl Zeiss fisheye lens - F-Distagon 3.5/30 CF T* (1996).
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) TFC-14 Series 1 Carbon Fiber Tripod - MFR # 13996.
- Really Right Stuff (RRS) BH-30 Ball Head with Mini Screw-Knob Clamp - MFR # BH-30 PRO.
- Hasselblad HATQCH (3043326) Tripod Quick Coupling.
- Arca-Swiss ARUCP38 Universal Camera Plate 3/8".
- Nikon AR-3 Shutter Release Cable.
- Artisan & Artist ACAM-302 Silk Cord for Hassleblad Cameras (Black).
I acquired the photograph (8272 x 6200 pixels) with an ISO of 3200, exposure time of 8 seconds, and aperture of f/3.5
Post-processing ...
Finder - Removed the CF card from the camera digital back and placed it in a Lexar 25-in-1 USB card reader. Then used Finder on my MacBook Air to download the raw image file (3FR extension) from the card.
Lightroom - Imported the 3FR image.
Lightroom - Used the Map module to add the location details to the EXIF header.
Lightroom - Applied the adjustments in the Develop module as outlined above
Lightroom - Saved the Develop module settings as preset 20170206-108.
Lightroom - Output the image as a JPEG image using the "Maximum" quality option (8272 x 6200 pixels).
PhotoSync - Copied the JPEG file to my iPad Mini for any final processing, review, enjoyment, and posting to social media.
@MomentsForZen #MomentsForZen #MFZ #Hasselblad #501CM #CFV50c #Lightroom #Night #NightSky #LongExposure #Sky #Cityscape #FisheyeLens #WideAngleLens #Apartments #Stars #MilkyWay #LargeMagellanicCloud #LMC #Pointers #SouthernPointers #SouthernCross #Cruc #AlphaCentauri #BetaCentauri #Hadar #Coalsack #CoalsackNebula #JewelBox #OmegaCentauri #EtaCarinae
Resembling the puffs of smoke and sparks from a summer fireworks display in this Hubble Space Telescope image, these delicate filaments are actually sheets of debris from a stellar explosion in a neighboring galaxy. Hubble's target was a supernova remnant within the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a nearby, small companion galaxy to the Milky Way visible from the Southern Hemisphere.
Denoted N 49, or DEM L 190, this remnant is from a massive star that died in a supernova blast whose light would have reached Earth thousands of years ago. This filamentary material will eventually be recycled into building new generations of stars in the LMC. Our own Sun and planets are constructed from similar debris of supernovae that exploded in the Milky Way billions of years ago.
This seemingly gentle structure also harbors a very powerful spinning neutron star that may be the central remnant from the initial blast. It is quite common for the core of an exploded supernova star to become a spinning neutron star (also called a pulsar — because of the regular pulses of energy from the rotational spin) after the immediate shedding of the star's outer layers. In the case of N 49, not only is the neutron star spinning at a rate of once every 8 seconds, it also has a super-strong magnetic field a thousand trillion times stronger than Earth's magnetic field. This places this star into the exclusive class of objects called "magnetars."
On March 5, 1979, this neutron star displayed a historic gamma-ray burst episode that was detected by numerous Earth-orbiting satellites. Gamma rays have a million or more times the energy of visible-light photons. Earth's atmosphere protects us by blocking gamma rays that originate from outer space. The neutron star in N 49 has had several subsequent gamma-ray emissions, and is now recognized as a "soft gamma-ray repeater." These objects are a peculiar class of stars producing gamma rays that are less energetic than those emitted by most gamma-ray bursters.
The neutron star in N 49 is also emitting X-rays, whose energies are slightly less than that of soft gamma rays. High-resolution X-ray satellites have resolved a point source near the center of N 49, the likely X-ray counterpart of the soft gamma-ray repeater. Diffuse filaments and knots throughout the supernova remnant are also visible in X-rays. The filamentary features visible in the optical image represent the blast wave sweeping through the ambient interstellar medium and nearby dense molecular clouds.
Today, N 49 is the target of astronomers who are interested in understanding whether small cloudlets in the interstellar medium of the LMC may have a marked effect on the physical structure and evolution of this supernova remnant.
This Hubble image of N 49 is a color representation of data taken in July 2000 with Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. Color filters were used to sample light emitted by sulfur, oxygen, and hydrogen. The color image has been superimposed on a black-and-white image of stars in the same field also taken with Hubble.
For more information please visit: hubblesite.org/image/1379/news_release/2003-20
Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
Acknowledgment: Y.-H. Chu (UIUC), S. Kulkarni (Caltech), and R. Rothschild (UCSD)
©All rights reserved.
Ngala Game Reserve, Kruger National Park, South Africa.
I took the title from an 80's song I love by The Church - Under the Milky Way.
This is the night sky over South Africa - much different from the light polluted areas that I'm from in Southern California.
While on safari at Ngala Game Reserve we would stop for a cocktail and wine break at each sunset then drive back in the dark. When we reached a clearing we would stop and star gaze. And quite literally we star gazed! With no light pollution we could see millions if not billions of stars. The Milky Way was obviously visible - here you can see it stretching diagonally across the sky from the bottom left to the top right of the image.
The Milky Way is the galaxy that we exist in. It appears like a streak across the sky because it is disc like in shape and we are looking at it from within the disc. It rotates about once every 15-50 million years. The galaxy as a whole is moving at a velocity of about 350 miles per second.
Another interesting insight is that the Southern Hemisphere sky is quite different from what I'm used to seeing too. Obviously we were looking at different stars but it was really quite odd. For instance Orion was upside down. And of course the was no North Star. There was, however, the Southern Cross - which is basically the polar opposite of the North Star.
Maybe the most interesting part of this image though is about half way up on the right side of the sky. See that small cloud-like smudge? That is the Large Magellanic Cloud, or LMC for short. It is another galaxy out side of ours. It is technically referred to as a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way and it is about 160,000 light years away. It is pretty mind blowing to see another galaxy in plain sight.
Press L to view large on black.
This stunning new Hubble image shows a small part of the Large Magellanic Cloud, one of the closest galaxies to our own. This collection of small baby stars, most weighing less than the Sun, form a young stellar cluster known as LH63. This cluster is still half-embedded in the cloud from which it was born, in a bright star-forming region known as the emission nebula LHA 120-N 51, or N51. This is just one of the hundreds of star-forming regions filled with young stars spread throughout the Large Magellanic Cloud.
More information: www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1408a/
Credit:
NASA, ESA, and D. Gouliermis (University of Heidelberg)
Acknowledgement: Luca Limatola
This dim and exotic nebula, 152,000 light years away on the northern outskirts of the LMC is contains three catalogued open star clusters, NGC1869, 1871 and 1873.
I really had no idea what I'd end up with when I started this, but it didn't disappoint.
This is a 12-hour image taken with an RC10 @f/6. ASI 6200MM camera, Baader HORGB filters and EQ6-PRO mount, over three weeks in September 2021..
I've posted x-rays only a few other times, but this time it's in color. The same Twitter thread that taught me how to get rid of the noise also taught me how to separate the energy levels so that I can make a color image. Here, red represents softer x-rays, while blue represents harder ones. Green lies between. I haven't studied x-ray astronomy to know much more about it. It takes a village, and I am but one woman... Anyway, hopefully a three-color x-ray image is more interesting than a one-color image.
For the smoothing, I used simple Gaussian blur filters with Photoshop. The brightest areas have only a 2px blur, while the dimmest areas have up to a 64px blur. So there are six levels of blur: 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, and 64 pixels each. Only the brightest parts of each blur layer are visible, and the masks themselves are smooth so that the transitions between each blur level are smooth. I can largely automate the process, but I find that I need to manually adjust the weight of the masks for the areas with the smaller blurs until it looks right. This is probably a pretty terrible way to do this, but I don't know a better way at this point.
There is an article at the Chandra website regarding this object and what is being illustrated. You may read it here, if you wish:
chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2012/n1929/
The Chandra+Hubble version is here:
The Hubble only version is here:
Data from Observation ID 3356 from Proposal Number 03910326 were used to create this image.
X-ray Emission Mechanisms and Evolution of Superbubbles
Red: .30-.95 keV
Green: .95-2.87 keV
Blue: 2.87-7.00 keV
North is NOT up. It is 19.6° counter-clockwise from up.
️ 30 Doradus - The Tarantula Nebula ️
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www.instagram.com/ale_motta_astrofotografia
A cosmic masterpiece, the Tarantula Nebula (30 Doradus) lies within the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and is one of the most dynamic star-forming regions in the Local Group of galaxies. Its spider-like web of glowing gas and young stars earned it the nickname Tarantula.
🔭 Target: 30 Doradus (Tarantula Nebula)
📍 Location: Constellation Dorado, approximately 160,000 light-years away
🌟 Apparent Magnitude: ~8
📐 Apparent Size: ~40 x 25 arcminutes
About the Region:
The Tarantula Nebula is a hotbed of stellar activity, housing some of the most massive and luminous stars known, such as those in the R136 cluster at its heart. This nebula is so luminous that, if it were as close as the Orion Nebula, it would cast shadows on Earth. The interplay of ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds sculpts intricate filaments of gas and dust, giving it its unique appearance.
🎨 Processing Notes:
The nebula's vibrant hues highlight emissions from hydrogen (Hα), oxygen (OIII), and sulfur (SII), revealing its intricate structure. This image emphasizes the nebula’s web-like formation and the dense star clusters embedded within.
Instrument: Telescope Takahashi FSQ-106ED, Camera FLI PL16803, Filters Astrodon Halpha, OIII, SII
Lights: Halpha 16x300", OIII 16x300", SII 16x300
#TarantulaNebula #30Doradus #LargeMagellanicCloud #Astrophotography #DeepSkyImaging
Edited United States Navy image of the Milky Way, Large and Small Magellanic Cloud galaxies (along with a bright planet - either Jupiter or Mars) while in the Red Sea. Seen from the deck of the USS Jason Dunham. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: RED SEA (Aug. 1, 2018) The guided-missile destroyer USS Jason Dunham (DDG 109) transits the Red Sea at night during exercise Eagle Salute 18. Eagle Salute 18 is a surface exercise with the Egyptian Naval Force (ENF) conducted to enhance interoperability and war-fighting readiness, fortify military-to-military relationships and advance operational capabilities of all participating units. Jason Dunham is deployed to the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations in support of naval operations to ensure maritime stability and security in the Central region, connecting the Mediterranean and the Pacific through the western Indian Ocean and three strategic choke points. (U.S. Navy photo by Senior Chief Intelligence Specialist Matt Bodenner/Released) 180801-N-PY230-4224
NGC 1850, imaged here with the Hubble Space Telescope, is an unusual double cluster that lies in the bar of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our own Milky Way. After the 30 Doradus complex, NGC 1850 is the brightest star cluster in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
It is representative of a special class of objects — young, globular-like star clusters — that have no counterpart in our galaxy. The two components of the cluster are both relatively young and consist of a main, globular-like cluster in the center and an even younger, smaller cluster, seen below and to the right, composed of extremely hot, blue stars and fainter, red stars. The main cluster is about 50 million years old; the smaller cluster is only 4 million years old.
This Hubble image is a good example of the interaction between gas, dust, and stars. Millions of years ago massive stars in the main cluster exploded as supernovae, forming the spectacular filigree pattern of diffuse gas visible in the image. It is believed that the birth of new stars can be triggered by the enormous forces in the shock fronts where the supernova blast waves hit and compress the gas. The nebulous gas is part of the N103 super bubble and looks similar to the well-known Cygnus Loop supernova remnant in our own Milky Way.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2001/news-2001-25.html
Credit: NASA, ESA, and Martino Romaniello (European Southern Observatory, Germany);
Acknowledgments: Martino Romaniello, Richard Hook, Bob Fosbury and the Hubble European Space Agency Information Center
NGC 4449 is a relatively nearby galaxy located in the constellation Canes Venatici. It is classified as an irregular galaxy, as is the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite of the Milky Way. Both have distinctive bar-like shapes in their cores.
In this image from Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, hot bluish-white clusters of massive stars are seen scattered throughout the galaxy, interspersed with numerous dustier, reddish regions of current star formation. Massive dark clouds of gas and dust are silhouetted against the starlight.
NGC 4449 is experiencing unusually intense star formation. Such "starbursts" usually occur in the central regions of galaxies, but NGC 4449 has more widespread star formation activity, since the youngest stars are observed both in the nucleus and in streams surrounding the galaxy.
A "global" starburst like NGC 4449 resembles much older, "primordial" star-forming galaxies, which grew by merging with and accreting smaller stellar systems. It's likely that the current widespread starburst in NGC 4449 was triggered by interaction or merging with a smaller companion.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/image/2155/news_release/2007-26
Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Aloisi (STScI/ESA), and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration
This is a mosaic of the Large Magellanic Cloud visible from the southern hemisphere, a companion/satellite galaxy of our Milkyway 160,000LY away.
Due to the angular size of the LMC, this image consists of 4 frames, each exposed in natural color at 500mm focal length through an 80mm refractor. The 4 frame are combined into one image to fit the whole satellite galaxy into the frame.
Exposure time was 2 hours and 42 minutes per frame for a total of 10 hours and 48 minutes for the whole image.
Mosaic of the Large Magellanic Cloud One of two (known) companion/satellite galaxies of the Milkyway galaxy, located 160,000LY away and only visible from the southern hemisphere. Due to the angular size of the LMC, this image consists of 4 frames, each exposed in natural color at 500mm focal length through an 80mm refractor. The 4 frame are combined into one image to fit the whole satellite galaxy into the frame. The camera used was my astromodded and active cooled canon 40D. Exposure time was 2 hours and 42 minutes per frame for a total of 11.5 hours for the whole image.
A small step is being taken up the stairs to one of the BlackGEM telescopes in this Picture of the Week, but this facility represents a giant leap in gravitational wave studies at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile. BlackGEM — which was developed by Radboud University, the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy, and the KU Leuven and officially inaugurated in January 2024 — is a mostly robotic array of optical telescopes designed to scan the southern sky.
Each telescope in the array is aimed at different parts of the clear sky above La Silla, ever ready to detect the visible light afterglow of gravitational wave sources — cataclysmic events such as merging neutron stars or black holes. BlackGEM will pinpoint where these sources are and provide astronomers with a target for follow-up observations with other, larger telescopes to learn more about them.
From the southern hemisphere, astronomers also have a pristine view of the Milky Way and our neighbour galaxies, the Magellanic Clouds, seen here in their characteristic wispy and cloud-like shape. In the Mapuche culture of south-central Chile, these clouds are known as lafken, labken or künchalabken (“the lagoons”) as well as rünanko (“the water wells”).
Credit: ESO/A. Ghizzi Panizza (www.albertoghizzipanizza.com)
Taken with a modified Canon 20D and 14 mm lens.
LINK
Mono Version: www.flickr.com/photos/jbrimacombe/51916881819/
ESO's Very Large Telescope has captured a detailed view of a star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud — one of the Milky Way's satellite galaxies. This sharp image reveals two glowing clouds of gas. NGC 2014 (right) is irregularly shaped and red and its neighbour, NGC 2020, is round and blue. These odd and very different forms were both sculpted by powerful stellar winds from extremely hot newborn stars that also radiate into the gas, causing it to glow brightly.
More information: www.eso.org/public/images/eso1335a/
Credit:
ESO
The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is a nearby galaxy, and a satellite of the Milky Way. At a distance of slightly less than 50 kiloparsecs (≈163,000 light-years), the LMC is the third closest galaxy to the Milky Way. It has a mass equivalent to approximately 10 billion times the mass of the Sun, making it roughly 1/100th as massive as the Milky Way, and a diameter of about 14,000 light-years.
It is visible as a faint "cloud" in the night sky of the southern hemisphere straddling the border between the constellations of Dorado and Mensa, and it appears from Earth more than 20 times the width of the full moon.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Magellanic_Cloud
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Photo taken at Serpentine Dam.
Canon 7D
Tamron Adaptall 135mm f2.8
30s, ISO 3200
Tracked with a Vixen Polarie
In this unusual image, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captures a rare view of the celestial equivalent of a geode — a gas cavity carved by the stellar wind and intense ultraviolet radiation from a hot young star.
Real geodes are baseball-sized, hollow rocks that start out as bubbles in volcanic or sedimentary rock. Only when these inconspicuous round rocks are split in half by a geologist do we get a chance to appreciate the inside of the rock cavity that is lined with crystals. In the case of this 35-light-year-diameter "celestial geode," the transparency of its bubble-like cavity of interstellar gas and dust reveals the treasures of its interior.
The object, called N44F, is being inflated by a torrent of fast-moving particles (called a "stellar wind") from an exceptionally hot star once buried inside a cold dense cloud. Compared with our Sun (which is losing mass through the so-called "solar wind"), the central star in N44F is ejecting more than a 100 million times more mass per second. The hurricane of particles moves much faster at about 4 million miles per hour (7 million kilometers per hour), as opposed to about 0.9 million miles per hour (1.5 million kilometers per hour) for our Sun. Because the bright central star does not exist in empty space but is surrounded by an envelope of gas, the stellar wind collides with this gas, pushing it out like a snowplow. This forms a bubble, whose striking structure is clearly visible in the crisp Hubble image.
The nebula N44F is one of a handful of known interstellar bubbles. Bubbles like these have been seen around evolved massive stars (Wolf-Rayet stars), and also around clusters of stars (where they are called "super-bubbles"). But they have rarely been viewed around isolated stars, as is the case here.
On closer inspection N44F harbors additional surprises. The interior wall of its gaseous cavity is lined with several four- to eight-light-year-high finger-like columns of cool dust and gas. (The structure of these "columns" is similar to the Eagle Nebula's iconic "Pillars of Creation" photographed by Hubble, and is seen in a few other nebulae as well). The fingers are created by a blistering ultraviolet radiation from the central star. Like windsocks caught in a gale, they point in the direction of the energy flow. These pillars look small in this image only because they are much farther away from us than the Eagle Nebula's pillars.
N44F is located about 160,000 light-years in our neighboring dwarf galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud, in the direction of the southern constellation Dorado. N44F is part of the larger N44 complex, which is a large super-bubble, blown out by the combined action of stellar winds and multiple supernova explosions. N44 itself is roughly 1,000 light-years across. Several compact star-forming regions, including N44F, are found along the rim of the central super-bubble.
This image was taken with Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 in March 2002, using filters that isolate light emitted by sulfur (shown in blue) and hydrogen gas (shown in red).
For more information please visit:
hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2004/news-2004-26.html
Credit: NASA, ESA, Y. Nazé (University of Liège, Belgium), and Y.-H. Chu (University of Illinois, Urbana)