Sagittarius Region of the Milky Way Galaxy                  

Three Image Mosaic    NGC 6590    IC 1284    M 24

 

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Taken @ Kitt Peak National Observatory June 13, 2004    Image Credit: Fred Calvert / Adam Block / NOAO / AURA / KPNO / NSF

An image like this shows that our galaxy is always "partly cloudy." Not unlike Earthly clouds that block parts of the sky (say on a starry night), tremendous clouds of gas and dust obscure the things that are beyond them. However, breaks in these galactic clouds can also be seen- even towards the densest part of our galaxy. M24 is the large oval collection of bluish stars that stands out among the others in the bottom right of this picture. To look at this stellar association of young and bright stars is to peer through a break in the obscuring clouds to places much deeper towards an inner spiral arm. The stars of M24 are many thousands of light years away (perhaps 10,000). The northern part of this starcloud boasts several dark nebula that provides contrast for all of the stars in the background. Near the bottom of the frame, IC 1284 glows bright red; while NGC 6590 scatters bluish light around a few bright stars   Text Credit: Adam Block

Equipment:  

Televue (480mm f6.3) SBIG ST10XME w Color Filter Wheel Piggybacked to a RC Optics 20" on a Paramount ME mount.

Exposure Data: Each Section

LRGB

Luminance = 15 minutes (synthetic) binned 1 X 1

Red = 15 minutes binned 1 X 1

Green = 15 minutes binned 1 X 1                                

Blue = 15 minutes binned 1 X 1

Total Exposure Time All Images, Darks, Flats, Bias = 4.0 Hour

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