The Triangulum Galaxy

NOTES
DATE:
Friday, October 8, 2010
TIME:
1:26 - 3:11 am EDT
CAMERA: Canon 550D (Hutech modified)
EXPOSURE:
1hour 40 minutes (10 x 5 minutes @ ISO 1600, 10 x 5 minutes @ ISO 3200)
LOCATION:
Okie-Tex Star Party (Camp Billy Joe located near Kenton, Oklahoma)
INSTRUMENT:
Astro-Tech 8" f/4 Imaging Newtonian (with Baader Coma Corrector)
MOUNT: Celestron CGEM Computerized Mount
GUIDING: Orion 70mm Refractor and Orion StarShoot AutoGuider
PROCESSING:
Registered, aligned, stacked, and dark frame subtracted with Deep Sky Stacker.  Further processing done with Adobe Photoshop CS3 (using Noel Carboni's Astronomy Tools), GradientXTerminator, and Noise Ninja 2.
COMMENTS:
M33 is the third largest member of the Local Group of Galaxies after the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and our own Milky Way.  Estimates state that M33 is 50,000 light-years in diamter; about half that of the Milky Way.  It is the second closest major galaxy to us after M31.  Two popular names for M33 are the Pinwheel Galaxy and the Triangulum Galaxy.  I prefer the later, since M101 is also referred to as the Pinwheel Galaxy.