The Outer Limits Galaxy: The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Outer Limits Galaxy since it was one of the Galaxies that was shown in the end credits of the 1960's show called...

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Outer Limits Galaxy since it was one of the Galaxies that was shown in the end credits of the 1960's show called "The Outer Limits" (It was one of my favorite shows back then).
NGC 891 is just over 27 million light years away and can be found in the constellation of Andromeda and shines at magnitude 10.84. This edge on spiral galaxy is thought to look like our galaxy from an edge on perspective and is approximately the same size as the Milky Way. On close inspection you can find several much more distant galaxies in the images. However only PGC 9042 at magnitude 16.23 shows up in my charts and can be found towards the top of the image about 1/2 way between the left edge and center of the image. The other many more faint galaxies can be spotted as elongated blobs of light and or are more fuzzy than the images of the stars.

The first image was taken using Luminance, Red Green and Blue filters. The second image added in an Image taken using a 5 nm Narrow band Hydrogren Alpha filter using the NBRGBCombination routine, which rebalances the color after adding in the Ha data (The NB stands for Narrow band, the RGB stands for Red, Green and Blue). Note: In the second image the little red areas along the dust line in galaxy that are brought out with the Hydrogen Alpha data (You will probably need to use double down to zoom in enough to see these red areas). These red dots reveal locations of active star formation. In both images the background star brightness was reduced to not distract from the image of the Galaxy.

All questions comments and suggestions are welcome.

For those interested
All images were taken using a 16" Schmidt Cassegrain telescope at a 4064mm focal length (F10). The camera used was a monochromatic ASI 6200MM pro cooled camera. The camera images were taken a -12 C with a gain of 100, with binning set to 1x1.

Luminance 91 subframes each 180 seconds long
Red 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Green 42 subframes each 240 seconds long
Blue 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Ha 66 subframes each 500 seconds long

LRGB image of NGC 891 (total exposure time 12 hours 17 minutes)

(Download)

LRGB Plus HA of NGC 891 (total exposure time 21 hours 27 minutes)

(Download)

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Neat!
(Nice desktop image.)

alberio Loc: Casa Grande AZ

Ok Ballard, you keep posting these exquisite images and it's like drugs to me, tempting me to buy new astro gear and spend countless hours in the dark capturing and processing these images. But wait, I have you and others doing that for me. Keep em coming.

photophile Loc: Lakewood, Ohio, USA

Ballard wrote:

The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Outer Limits Galaxy since it was one of the Galaxies that was shown in the end credits of the 1960's show called "The Outer Limits" (It was one of my favorite shows back then).
NGC 891 is just over 27 million light years away and can be found in the constellation of Andromeda and shines at magnitude 10.84. This edge on spiral galaxy is thought to look like our galaxy from an edge on perspective and is approximately the same size as the Milky Way. On close inspection you can find several much more distant galaxies in the images. However only PGC 9042 at magnitude 16.23 shows up in my charts and can be found towards the top of the image about 1/2 way between the left edge and center of the image. The other many more faint galaxies can be spotted as elongated blobs of light and or are more fuzzy than the images of the stars.

The first image was taken using Luminance, Red Green and Blue filters. The second image added in an Image taken using a 5 nm Narrow band Hydrogren Alpha filter using the NBRGBCombination routine, which rebalances the color after adding in the Ha data (The NB stands for Narrow band, the RGB stands for Red, Green and Blue). Note: In the second image the little red areas along the dust line in galaxy that are brought out with the Hydrogen Alpha data (You will probably need to use double down to zoom in enough to see these red areas). These red dots reveal locations of active star formation. In both images the background star brightness was reduced to not distract from the image of the Galaxy.

All questions comments and suggestions are welcome.

For those interested
All images were taken using a 16" Schmidt Cassegrain telescope at a 4064mm focal length (F10). The camera used was a monochromatic ASI 6200MM pro cooled camera. The camera images were taken a -12 C with a gain of 100, with binning set to 1x1.

Luminance 91 subframes each 180 seconds long
Red 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Green 42 subframes each 240 seconds long
Blue 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Ha 66 subframes each 500 seconds long

The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Oute... (show quote)

Inspiring!

bcheary Loc: Jacksonville, FL

Ballard wrote:

The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Outer Limits Galaxy since it was one of the Galaxies that was shown in the end credits of the 1960's show called "The Outer Limits" (It was one of my favorite shows back then).
NGC 891 is just over 27 million light years away and can be found in the constellation of Andromeda and shines at magnitude 10.84. This edge on spiral galaxy is thought to look like our galaxy from an edge on perspective and is approximately the same size as the Milky Way. On close inspection you can find several much more distant galaxies in the images. However only PGC 9042 at magnitude 16.23 shows up in my charts and can be found towards the top of the image about 1/2 way between the left edge and center of the image. The other many more faint galaxies can be spotted as elongated blobs of light and or are more fuzzy than the images of the stars.

The first image was taken using Luminance, Red Green and Blue filters. The second image added in an Image taken using a 5 nm Narrow band Hydrogren Alpha filter using the NBRGBCombination routine, which rebalances the color after adding in the Ha data (The NB stands for Narrow band, the RGB stands for Red, Green and Blue). Note: In the second image the little red areas along the dust line in galaxy that are brought out with the Hydrogen Alpha data (You will probably need to use double down to zoom in enough to see these red areas). These red dots reveal locations of active star formation. In both images the background star brightness was reduced to not distract from the image of the Galaxy.

All questions comments and suggestions are welcome.

For those interested
All images were taken using a 16" Schmidt Cassegrain telescope at a 4064mm focal length (F10). The camera used was a monochromatic ASI 6200MM pro cooled camera. The camera images were taken a -12 C with a gain of 100, with binning set to 1x1.

Luminance 91 subframes each 180 seconds long
Red 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Green 42 subframes each 240 seconds long
Blue 37 subframes each 240 seconds long
Ha 66 subframes each 500 seconds long

The images below are of NGC 891 nicknamed the Oute... (show quote)

Cool.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

Longshadow wrote:

Neat!
(Nice desktop image.)

Hi Longshadow
Thanks for checking out the images of NGC 891 and for the comment.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

alberio wrote:

Ok Ballard, you keep posting these exquisite images and it's like drugs to me, tempting me to buy new astro gear and spend countless hours in the dark capturing and processing these images. But wait, I have you and others doing that for me. Keep em coming.

Hi ablerio
Thanks for viewing the images of The Outer Limits galaxy and for the comment. Yep these do take a lot of time to take and process. I have already sunk a fair amount of cash into it, but I can't take it with me and it keeps me busy.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

photophile wrote:

Inspiring!

Hi photophile
Thanks for checking out the images of NGC 891 and for the comment.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

bcheary wrote:

Cool.

Hi bcheary
Thank you viewing the photos of NGC 891, for the comment and the Thumbs up.

NMGal Loc: NE NM

Fascinating.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

NMGal wrote:

Fascinating.

Hi NMGal
Thanks for viewing the images of NGC 891 and for the comment.

gekko11 Loc: Las Cruces NM

Inspiring for sure! your beautiful shots are getting me to feel like i should get back out there and work at it some more! Please keep posting !!!

Earnest Botello Loc: Hockley, Texas

Excellent set, Ballard.

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

gekko11 wrote:

Inspiring for sure! your beautiful shots are getting me to feel like i should get back out there and work at it some more! Please keep posting !!!

Hi gekko11
Thanks for checking out the images of NGC 891 and for the comment. Taking and processing these images is very rewarding and keeps me learning new things. I've posted most of my recent images on the Astronomical Forum but every now and then I post on the Photo Gallery forum to hopefully get more folks interested in astronomy. For those interested the less compressed version of the astronomical images I've taken can be found and download from https://ballardbare.smugmug.com/Astronomical-Images/

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

Earnest Botello wrote:

Excellent set, Ballard.

Hi Earnest Botello
Thanks for viewing the images of NGC 891 and for the comment.