Category: Astronomy

  • Hunting for satellites

    Hunting for satellites

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    Luca Zanini
    in

    On August 12, 2023 I photographed Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus with the intention of identifying their satellites and for this reason the central planet is overexposed.There are also other satellites in the pictures but they are not visible because they are too dim or too close to the planet.The number near the name of the…

  • NGC 708

    NGC 708

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    The photo shows a small portion of the sky in the constellation Andromeda.Why is this photo special?In a portion of the sky about the size of a full moon, there are 61 galaxies:10 galaxies from the NGC (New General Catalogue) and among these NGC 708 which is the largest galaxy in the center of the…

  • The Stephan’s Quintet

    The Stephan’s Quintet

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    The Stephan’s Quintet are five galaxies, NGC 7317, NGC 7318A, NGC 7318B, NGC 7319 and NGC 7320 of which the first four are also physically close and interacting with each other while NGC 7320 is only prospectively close to the others.It is not an easy subject to photograph, the five galaxies have surface magnitudes between…

  • M 31

    M 31

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    M 31 or NGC 224, better known as the Andromeda galaxy, is a barred spiral galaxy about 2.5 million light-years from the Milky Way and it is the largest galaxy in the Local Group.The glow that can be seen in the lower left is part of the galaxy M 110, a satellite of the Andromeda…

  • M 20

    M 20

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    The nebula M 20 or NGC 6514, known as the Trifid nebula due to its shape, is located in the constellation Sagittarius.

  • Saturn

    Saturn

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    Luca Zanini
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    Saturn, photographed at 4:04 local time on July 15, 2023; the image is the processing of 10% of the best 902 frames taken in one minute.

  • NGC 6995

    NGC 6995

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    Luca Zanini
    in

    The photo shows part of the Veil nebula, centered on NGC 6995, and it is the remnant of a supernova that exploded about 10,000 to 20,000 years ago.

  • M 8

    M 8

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    The Lagoon nebula, or M 8 or NGC 6523, is an emission nebula in the constellation Sagittarius and contains within it the open cluster NGC 6530.

  • Last quarter moon

    Last quarter moon

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    Here are some shots of the moon in a phase very close to the last quarter.

  • M 101

    M 101

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    by

    Luca Zanini
    in

    The spiral galaxy M 101 or NGC 5457 in the constellation Ursa Major, photographed on January 14, 2023 at 01:51:59 universal time, 02:51:59 local time for an exposure time of 30 minutes.