Four years ago I published my
first Top 100 poster. Two years ago, as I imaged more objects, I published a
second edition. This post is now my third edition of My Top 100 Astrophotography Targets, chosen from the 2000 DSOs I have imaged so far.
For this poster, I have decided to throw out the previous rankings and to build the list from scratch. My criteria for ranking the images are three-fold:
- Wonder & Awe – A sense of “Wow, what exactly am I looking at, and how did it get to be that way?” This is the feeling that many of us had when viewing the first Webb images.
- Beauty – The colors, shapes, details, framing and size all need work together to create a beautiful result. Sometimes, an odd placed bright star or an uncomfortable asymmetry can be enough to take an object down from great to good.
- Uniqueness – How does this object stand out from other similar ones in the list? Does it stick in your memory long after you have seen it?
The images are listed from 1 to 100, started with my favorite. I decided to spread the 100 images over 4 posters (Revisions A to D) this time – putting them all on one page did not give each of them enough size to be appreciated. The technical data for these 100 objects is shown on the next 4 posters, Revisions E to H.
The breakdown of the 100 objects by type is as follows:
- 22 narrowband emission nebulae
- 14 planetary nebulae
- 11 reflection nebulae
- 11 multiple galaxies
- 10 single galaxies
- 8 supernova remnants
- 6 dark nebulae
- 5 HII emission nebulae
- 5 Wolf-Rayet nebulae
- 2 protoplanetary nebulae
- 2 globular star clusters
- 1 galaxy cluster
- 1 open star cluster
- 1 YSO nebulae
- 1 star nova
The breakdown of the 100 objects by size range (arc-minutes) is as follows:
- > 60: 18
- 20 to 60: 32
- 3 to 20: 30
- < 3: 20
The breakdown of the 100 objects by declination range is as follows:
- > +30 deg: 46
- +30 to 0 deg: 22
- 0 to -30 deg: 23
- < -30 deg: 9
In putting together this list, I tried to listen closely to that part of my soul that I have ignored in the past. That part which says, “Hey, even though others seem to love this target, deep down, I don’t really think it is that great!”. This means leaving many objects off of the list which traditionally have made these types of lists. These objects include:
- NGC 7331 (Deer Lick Galaxy) – I never felt this one was that special, made worse by its terrible nickname.
- M33 (Triangulum Galaxy) – A popular galaxy because of its size and location, but not spectacular in structure
- NGC 6992 (Eastern Veil Nebula) - A beautiful object but 3 better Cygnus Loop objects made the list.
- NGC 869 – The nicest double cluster, but not quite enough visually overall to compete.
- M63 / M65 / M106 / NGC 253 Wonderful galaxies but each not sufficiently unique to make the cut.
- NGC 246 / NGC 7008 Nice PN, but the list already had 14 other PN that are more interesting.
If you would like to read more about any of the top 100 objects, each of the objects in the poster has previously been uploaded and described individually on Astrobin. They all reside in my
Astrobin Top 100 Favorites Collection.
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