@tiff_needs_space: How many galaxies can you count? The Coma Cluster (Abell 1656) is a massive, dense collection of over 1,000 galaxies located about 300-350 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices, notable for its large elliptical galaxies like NGC 4874 and NGC 4889. It's a key object in astronomy, famous for being one of the first places where the existence of dark matter was proposed by Fritz Zwicky in 1933, who observed that the galaxies were moving too fast to be held together by visible matter alone. The cluster is a major component of the larger Coma Supercluster and is used to study galaxy evolution and the universe's expansion. -- It’s spring! That also means it’s galaxy season. What is galaxy season you ask? It’s when our night sky shifts from the dense, dust-filled plane of the Milky Way to a clearer, more transparent view out into deep space, where dust and gas no longer block our line of sight. This allows us to see far beyond our own galaxy into regions rich with distant galaxies, including massive clusters like the Coma Cluster and the Virgo Cluster. Imaging this was full of fun... And a lot of frustration. I wasn't freezing, I got to use my larger telescope, I saw a firefly larva, then a meteor!! But I also ended up with guiding errors (that were my fault due to fiddling with cables while it was calibrating) and I'm still not 100% happy with how soft the image turned out. Always learning though! I've wanted to image this massive cluster of galaxies for a while now, and while I'm not entirely pleased with the results (likely due to the ol' reducer and lack of contrast of the 8" edition of the EdgeHD 8) I'm still pleased to have nabbed it. And I'll definitely be revisiting it once my skills have evolved! I may even make a bigger project out of the scope not reduced... The Nitty Gritty: Location: Central MO, USA. Bortle 4 backyard Moon: 5-10% Integration: ~10hr RGB (120" subs) Camera: @zwoasi ASI2600MM Pro Scope: @celestron EdgeHD8 Mount: @skywatcherusa EQ6-R Pro Filter: Antlia RGB Guiding: @zwoasi ASI174MM Mini + @celestron OAG #space #Astronomy #galaxyseason #photography #Science

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Monday 23 March 2026 13:27:30 GMT