Star-fields, Constellations, Clusters, Asterisms, and more…Since the beginning of time, man has been looking up while trying to make sense of all they could see in the stars. Today, for many of us, light pollution limits what we can see with the naked eye, but I assure you… it is all still up there. Here is a collection of photos I have taken of various star-related objects.
ARCTURUS F4 2021-05-06
Arcturus via Canon 200mm @ f/4 on 2021-05-06
M13 Hercules Globular Cluster 2021-04-04
Hercules Globular Cluster (M13) from 2021-04-04 with my 8″ SCT. It is the home of, well…, many stars. ? It is about 25,000 light-years from Earth and if the skies were good enough, and dark enough, you might just make it out in the night sky with your eyes. It is comprised of 209 30-second individual exposures using a monochrome astrophotography camera and R/G/B filters.
90x 30s Red Channel
74x 30s Green Channel
45x30s Blue Channel
If you zoom in a bit, you will likely notice many more stars.
M3 2021-04-03 200mm
Taken with the Canon 200mm. This is the M3 Globular Cluster. It is made up of about 500,000 stars and is ~32,000 light-years from Earth. Not bad for a Canon lens… It is a combination of 62x 30s stacked images.
Pleiades
Pleiades, aka The Seven Sisters. (2021-02-02) You can see this blue-ish smudge in the night sky with your own eyes if you know where to look.
Praesepe Cluster
Praesepe Cluster
Constellation Orion
Next time you look up and see Orion (look for the belt, it is easy to find), I want you to remember this image and all of the stars that you cannot see due to light pollution. The universe is vast to say the least.
Pegasus Globular Cluster (M15)
2020-10-30
Pegasus Globular Cluster (M15)
Home to over 100,000 stars!
Starfield
This is a star-field I had fun capturing. It is located within the North American Nebula.
So… many… stars…
Brocchis Cluster
This is an Asterism often referred to as the Coathanger. This image only contains 5 of the 10 stars that make up the entire coathanger.
NGC6341 (M92)
Just another cluster located in the constellation Hercules.
Hercules Globular Cluster (M13)
In the upper right of this image also take note of NGC6207 which is a galaxy that is about 30 million light-years away.
Now for the amazing part… Draw a line from that galaxy to the lower portion of the cluster. Midway along the route, you will see a small streak. This is IC 4617 which is another galaxy estimated to be 489 million light-years from Earth!!!
