M45 - The Pleiades (Victor Van Puyenbroeck)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Taurus (Tau) · Contains: Maia nebula · Merope nebula · NGC 1432 · NGC 1435 · The star 18Tau · The star Atlas (27Tau) · The star Celaeno (16Tau) · The star Electra (17Tau) · The star Merope (23Tau) · The star Pleione (28Tau) · The star Sterope I (21Tau) · The star Taygeta (19Tau) · The star ηTau

M45 - The Pleiades, Victor Van Puyenbroeck

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M45 - The Pleiades

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M45 - The Pleiades

The Pleiades open star cluster is one of the brightest deep-sky objects in the night's sky and easily visible, even from light polluted sites such as the inner city. These bright blue stars lie around 440 light years away from earth and are moving through a cloud of interstellar dust, which creates the faint blue reflection nebula around the stars.

I've photographed this cluster already in February 2016, when I was just starting to learn astrophotography. Most of my photos show only the stars, with almost no nebulosity. The past year has showed me the importance of darker skies and longer integration time, so for my first serious attempt, I drove to my 'dark site' (red zone) under a new moon and captured two hours of sub-exposures, with manual dithering every 10 frames.

The photo clearly shows the reflection nebula, and I am pretty pleased with the amount of detail visible through my cheap ST-80 telescope. There was quite a bit of wind, but the night was dry and very cold, so I did not use darks. However, my hands and feet were completely frozen!

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Astrophotographers of Belgium
Beginners AP
Cloudy Nights
Broadband under Bortle 7/8/9
Imaged with APT

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Astrometry.net job	1387255
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