Welcome to my April photos. Even though the night skies have been cloudy this month, there were a few nights where I was able to get the telescope out and take some photos. Here goes….
In April I put together a composite of photos taken in March to give a bigger view of an interesting area in Virgo and Coma Berenices constellations. This includes the Markarian’s Chain I posted in March, but also a bunch of Messier galaxies that make a loop near the chain.
There are several Messier galaxies in the sky in April. As you may recall, Charles Messier was a French astronomer in the 1700s who created a list of things to ignore because they were not asteroids (he was pretty passionate about finding asteroids and didn’t want to waste his time on these fuzzy little objects). M 51 is a favorite, and to see what it looks like without the stars from our galaxy getting in the way, I removed the stars using the StarNet+ software I talked about last month.
Here are a couple of Messier star clusters. When the stars are all bunched close together they are called a Globular Cluster, but when they are spread out but close enough to be gravitationally attracted, they are an Open Star Cluster. All are within our own galaxy, the Milky Way.
The Moon is so cool to photograph. Seems like every time I look at it, I see something new. Here’s a look at a composite photo of the moon (that means it’s too big for one image to capture, so in this case, it is two images that are “stitched” together). The second image is a close up of and area in the composite I wanted to know more about. When I think of the moon I think of the “seas” (big flat dark areas or “Mares”) and craters. But there are also mountains and mountain ranges caused by impacts millions of years ago. The close up shows the Apennins Mountain Range that lies between the Mare Serenitatis and Mare Imbrium, and a couple of mountain peaks (“Montes”) between 11,000’ and 14,500’ tall.
There are 110 Messier objects. They are some of the “low hanging fruit” that amateur astrophotographers like me like to take photos of. In 1995, Patrick Caldwell-Moore, an English astrophotographer, created a list of 109 additional night sky objects that are visible with small telescopes. Some are also only visible from the Southern Hemisphere, so maybe I need to take a trip! I am within a half dozen of having photographed all 110 Messier objects, so I’m starting in on the Caldwell Catalog objects. Here’s what I found this month.
The galaxies I typically photograph are all less than 100 million light years away. So I was wondering this month what the limit for a telescope like mine is for seeing deeper into space? 150 million light years….? 200 million light years….? I did a little research and found this one: NGC 4889. It is the largest and most massive galaxy visible from Earth and is categorized as a supergiant elliptical galaxy. 308 Million Light years away! Can you spot the other galaxies in this photo? If it looks fuzzy, chances are it’s a galaxy!
But digging a little deeper I found another one even further way that I could see. 3C 273 is a Quasar. Quasars emit exceptionally large amounts of energy and have supermassive black holes. 3C 273 is over 4 trillion times more luminous than our Sun. It’s the largest Quasar visible from Earth, and it is 2.5 BILLION light years away! Considering that our Universe is 13.8 billion light years across, my little 8” telescope is getting out there!
Finally, I’m a guy who loves to look at eclipses (we’re already making plans to see the next total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024 down in Texas! Plus, there is a lunar eclipse coming up this month in May on the 15th-16th!). So when I saw this video taken by NASA’s Perseverance Rover taken from Mars it just blew me away. Mars has a moon, Phobos, that is shaped like a lumpy potato. Here’s what a potato shaped moon looks like transiting across the Sun. Ooooh…..
https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/04/nasa-rover-captures-an-amazing-view-of-a-solar-eclipse-on-mars/
Until next month…Clear Skies!
Hank
i love the potato moon.
doesn’t seem “right”.
Very nice work Hank! A great way to stargaze via EAA…you are accumulating quite a collection, and also provide an interesting prospective that is quite analogous to traditional visual observing.
RonD
Ron–Thanks! EAA is great for me because I can get an image within a few minutes that can be save and studied later. My set-up also allows me to be inside observing and capturing images when it’s cold outside. It has been as low a -15 degrees out and everything works, even without a pod observatory! All of this fits in with my short attention span!
EAA allows me to collect a large number of images. They don’t have the detail that I see coming from long exposure astrophotography, but after two years I am within a few of having all the Messier targets, as well as over a hundred others. I am thinking about putting those together in some kind of print format.
The Bonus is that every month I am able to share them with about 100 family and friends. This hobby is raising awareness about the night sky with us all. For me it’s about sharing my excitement for the night sky.
Great work, Hank. Your continued enthusiasm and your willingness to direct your enthusiasm and passion to a diverse audience of non-imagers and imagers is wonderful.
I envy your persistence and willingness to image and distribute all that you see, all your ponderings, and all that you know or can reference.
You really are a Society asset that we must exploit to the fullest.
CS, Rod