Observation Log - January 23, 2001 - Tinton Falls, NJ

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[NOTE: The seeing was fair tonight, until clouds came in around midnight. Setup on the 12" Meade LX200 was the Crayford focuser/f3.3 reducer/1.25" visual back/MX516 camera. Tonight the images were all taken WITHOUT the IR blocking filter. Used flats from the previous night, as I left the setup the same. -GW]

M33, a spiral galaxy in Triangulum, magnitude 5.7, dimensions 73' x 45', surface brightness is 13.8 mag/sq arcmin, and a distance of 2.4 million light years. This is a four-frame mosaic, with images shot between 6:28 and 8:28 p.m. the evening of January 22. Each of the four frames were created from 22 exposures for a total integration time of 22 minutes each. All images were processed in AstroArt with darks, flats and flat-darks, then aligned and composited. Then I moved the images into MaxIm. Once there, I created the mosaic, then applied an unsharp mask (FFT, low-pass, mild) and the image was finished with a slight contrast stretch.

NGC2329, a galaxy in Lynx, magnitude 12.4, dimensions 1'.3 x 1'.1, surface brightness is 12.8 mag/sq arcmin. This was made from 97 one-minute images shot between 9:09 and 11:06 p.m. the evening of January 22. All images were processed in AstroArt with darks, flats and flat-darks, then aligned and composited. Then I moved the image into MaxIm for a slight contrast stretch. There are several other galaxies present in this image, as shown in this map of NGC2329. Identified on the map are PGC20283 (mag 15.3, 36" x 35"), PGC20268 (mag 13.6, 1'.0 x 0'.7), and PGC20246 (mag 15.8, 30" x 24".) There are several galaxies which are even fainter that could not be identified using SkyMap Pro 6.0.

NGC3098, a spiral galaxy in Leo, magnitude 12.0, dimensions 2'.3 x 0'.6, surface brightness is 11.4 mag/sq arcmin, and a distance of 55 million light years. This was made from 47 one-minute exposures shot between 11:20 and 12:15 a.m. the morning of January 23. All images were processed in AstroArt with darks, flats and flat-darks, then aligned and composited. Then I moved the images into MaxIm, then did a flatten background operation and an unsharp mask (FFT, low-pass, mild). The image was finished with a slight contrast stretch.