The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) stands out prominently at the moment in our beautiful dark skies as a large cloudy patch and it’s often mistaken just for that by newcomers looking at the night sky…
This irregular type galaxy is one of the two satellite galaxies that are gravitationally bound to our own Milky Way galaxy and is approximately 180,000 light years away from us; the other one is the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC).
Here in the land down under they are nearly always on display as they are circumpolar and rotate around our south celestial pole. I should rephrase that and say we on earth rotate, but we don’t usually say that :-)
Image was taken with a Canon 70D camera and Canon 70-200mm f2.8 lens set at f3.2, which was attached to the top of a tracking Meade LX200 Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope at my Stardust Observatory. Exposures were 30x1 minute subs and 20x1 minute darks with ISO2000, then stacked in DSS and processed in PS CS4.
This irregular type galaxy is one of the two satellite galaxies that are gravitationally bound to our own Milky Way galaxy and is approximately 180,000 light years away from us; the other one is the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC).
Here in the land down under they are nearly always on display as they are circumpolar and rotate around our south celestial pole. I should rephrase that and say we on earth rotate, but we don’t usually say that :-)
Image was taken with a Canon 70D camera and Canon 70-200mm f2.8 lens set at f3.2, which was attached to the top of a tracking Meade LX200 Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope at my Stardust Observatory. Exposures were 30x1 minute subs and 20x1 minute darks with ISO2000, then stacked in DSS and processed in PS CS4.
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