Globular Clusters

[Les]

One of the most glorious sights in the night sky are Globular Clusters. They are vast globes of thousands of stars that surround our galaxy in a sort of halo. About 100 of these semi independent cluster bound together by their own gravity but also held firmly by the vast grip of the Milky Way. Other galaxies have their own family of globulars. This one is M3 that contains over 45,000 suns, in a globe 200 light years across.The distance is 48,000 light years. Being so compact any alien observer near the centre of such a system would witness dozens of blazing stars brighter than a full Moon appears to us. It must be a spectacular sight but the sky would never be dark the drawback being that any beings would not be have any idea of the Universe beyond the confined of the cluster itself.

Luckily globulars are easily imaged with DSLR's attached to a suitable driven telescope.

The image was taken at 4:30 this morning using a Nikon 3200 DSLR attached at prime focus of a 16" f4.4 Newtonian reflector. Exposure was 15 seconds at 3200ISO 

Edited January 4, 2022 by Les

[Denis]

Amazing Les, thanks

 

[Les]

Another two Globulars imaged early this morning using the same setup and settings as before.

The two brightest Globulars Omega Centauri and 47 Tucanae are easily visible to the naked eye(Albeit smudges) but unfortunately they are southern hemisphere objects.

M13 in Hercules is the northern hemispheres brightest Globular and is visible with binoculars. The first image is the majestic M13,which is a easy target for a DSLR. On the other end of the scale is the faintest Globular in the entire sky NGC 2419 .

Its faintness is due to its immense distance 300,000 light years (compared to 26,000 light years for M13). This wayward Globular is so far away from its Milky Way parent its nicknamed the inter galactic wanderer. Its even sometimes unkindly called The Tramp!

Even with my 16" Newtonian it is faint visually but the Nikon 3200 DSLR shows it well under the circumstances. I use a exposure of 15 seconds a 6,400 ISO. 

Two images to follow (M13 then NGC2419)

Edited February 27, 2022 by Les

[Les]

[Les]