Astronomy photos from the Dwarf 3 telescope

  Captured the Pacman Nebula (NGC 281). And the Andromeda Galaxy (M31)

  New objects tonight.  First, the California Nebula. This emission nebula bears a slight resemblence to the shape of the State of California. Next the Pleiades (M45). This is an open star cluster that is the nearest Messier object to the Earth.  Lastly, the Heart Nebula. You can just make out the top of the heart shape in red.

 Tonight a repeat of the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51): And the Sombrero Galaxy which failed in attempts to stack - clouds after I headed in perhaps.

 Caught two new objects: The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) - a spiral galaxy with a dwarf companion. It was the first galaxy to be classified as a spiral.  The Sombrero Galaxy (M104) - an edge on galaxy.  This galaxy is of uncertain shape with a prominent central dark dust lane.

  The Horsehead Nebula (Barnard 33) - this is a smaller dark nebula located in the constellation Orion.  The Crab Nebula (M1) - This nebula is the leftovers after a supernova exploded in the year 1054. 

 Grabbed three new objects in the January sky.  The Triangulum Galaxy (M33) -  a face on spiral galaxy.   This galaxy is 2.75 million light years from Earth. One light year is just about 6 trillion miles.  The Orion Nebula (M42) - a nebula is a cloud of dust and gas that glows due to the stars that are being created from this cloud of hydrogen gas. Bode's Galaxy (M81) and the Cigar Galaxy (M82) -  Bode's a spiral galaxy about 12 million light years away from Earth.  Its center contains a supermassive black hole with an estimated mass of 70 million of our Suns. The Cigar Galaxy, just above Bode's, is a starburst galaxy of extemely high star formation. 

 After a 6 month wait the new "smart telescope" has arrived.  There is no eyepiece to view the celestial objects. Instead, the telescope is linked to your phone or tablet for viewing and images are downloaded when you connect the scope to your desktop. Dwarf 3 telescope First night's images: The Andromeda Galaxy This galaxy is approximately 2.5 million light years from Earth.  Thought to be about the same size as the Milky Way Galaxy and it's headed our way. Should arrive in 4 to 5 billion years. Few actual collisions are expected as the stars are so widely distributed with the final result being one much larger galaxy. This is the only object visible to our naked eye that lies outside of the Milky Way. Everything else we see at night, lies within our own galaxy.  Here is the same image as it comes off the telscope with zero processing.  Here is one more image with the number of background stars reduced through processing.