One of the most fascinating and unique shapes of any galaxy, this galaxy formed from the collision of two galaxies and is the only one known to have formed from a late stage lenticular galaxy. Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGC_660To me, I think this is an absolutely awesome sight and I really wanted to call it the "DNA Helix Galaxy" instead. The poles are offset a bit and I will include an alternate angle version with the central core aligned to the horizon.
Acquisition:
Long focal length is needed if you really want to dig into multiple structures on this one. It probably isn't too bright that you couldn't run longer RGB exposures, but I went with many many short exposures to reduce OSC noise with dithering and to pull out a lot of color fine details. Absolutely massive data storage space was required for this technique - 328 gig for all the intermediate files and drafts. Not the largest number of data nights I've ever spent, but definitely the largest pure data size capture.
Processing:I would rank this as a medium/medium-high of all the targets I have shot so far. If I could shoot from a mountain-top instead of 250meters above sea level, it would probably be easier. Lots of details that have to be pulled out bit by bit, but that detail can also be tricky and it can look like grainy noise in the central core if pulled too far. May need to start from scratch several times to see what you have in your data, or at least I had to.
There are several bright stars in the vicinity and even a tiny spiral galaxy near the disc. Since the target is so irregularly shaped, the GAME script (in PixInsight) was very useful in masking the main core since it is still elliptical in shape and you can get a clean border zone.
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