NGC 404 - Mirach's Ghost (in Andromeda)

Dear group,

Here is a rarely imaged Seyfert galaxy only seven arc-minutes away from bright Mirach (beta-And, mag 2.06) from last night:

http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-DSO-NGC-0404.htm

The result came out much better than expected, for there were strong winds and I purposely did not stick around for very long therafter so as not to endanger further my equipment.

Clear skies!

Anthony.

[COLOR="Purple"]Very nice AA!!
I've always loved that one ever since I stumbled upon it one night and had to look it up to see what it was. Now I always stop for a look when the scope is in that area since I know where it is and it's so easy to find.
Thanks for sharing!
Bill[/COLOR]

That is very cool!

You processed this very well,it must have been a challenge to deal with Mirach.
A very aesthetic result!


Jason

Excellent Image Anthony. Thanks for sharing and for informing me of a galaxy I did not know.

Anthony:

You got a good one there.

The other night I had my 8 inch F/5 setup to shoot Jupiter with an Orion Starshoot 1 and when Jupiter became lost in the trees, I decided to pull out my old Pegasus camera. It uses the same chip as the ST-237 and has two stages of cooling so there is some potential there but my Polar Alignment was barely good enough for planetary imaging and definitely not up to long exposures. I did take a couple of shots of beta Andromeda to see if I could detect NGC404 and sure enough, beside the blooming (I turned off the Anti-blooming), beside the fact that anything over a 7 second exposure showed the bad alignment, I could make out a bit of fuzz right where NGC404 ought to be...

This photo is a testament to the quality of Anthony's work... The difference between a careful, skilled photographer and a lazy, visual astronomer breaking out the cooled camera for the first time in a year or so...



Jon

Attached Image:

Nice image. This is a tough object and really not suited for a SCT due to reflections from the corrector. Here is my version from last year. 2 x 4min with a Canon DSLR through my C-11 @ f/6.

Thanks

Joe

Attached Image:

Very nice work Anthony!