The large star cluster in Coma Berenices known officially as Melotte 111, at right, with two of the most prominent galaxies in Coma at left: NGC 4559
The large star cluster in Coma Berenices known officially as Melotte 111, at right, with two of the most prominent galaxies in Coma at left: NGC 4559 at top and the Needle Galaxy, NGC 4565, at bottom. Several other fainter galaxies are in the field, including NGC 4494 between the Needle Galaxy and the star cluster, but looking very star-like at this image scale. I shot this April 11, 2021 on a fairly clear night as a test of the new SharpStar 94mm EDPH refractor telescope and its matching field flattener/reducer. A bit of passing haze added a touch of star glows. There is a version of this same field shot a week earlier in hazy skies with much fuzzier stars. This is a stack of 20 x 6-minute exposures at ISO 800 with the Canon EOS Ra, autoguided on the Astro-Physics Mach 1 mount with the Lacerta MGEN3 stand-alone autoguided set to dither 5 pixels between each exposure. No dark frames or LENR were applied. The field of view is about ° x 5°.
Size: 5400px × 3603px
Photo credit: © Alan Dyer / VWPics / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 4275, 4408, 4494, 4559, 4565, 94mm, astrograph, autoguider, berenices, canon, cluster, coma, edph, eos, galaxies, galaxy, mel111, mgen3, needle, ngc, ra, sharpstar, spring, star
