Tag: M65

Leo triplet

Leo triplet is a group of galaxies in the constellation Leo. It contains galaxies NGC 3628 (upper left), Messier 65 (upper right), and Messier 66 (middle down). These galaxies are visible nicely in spring when the constellation Leo rises in the southern part of the sky.

I captured the picture shown here last year, but I haven’t had time to process it so far. It is interesting to compare the progress I made in astrophotography in the last few years. I made the very first picture of this group of galaxies in 2015 and for the first time, I used Pixinsight software for post-processing. The improvement over the freeware Deep Space Stacker was enormous. Similar boost I got recently when I installed BlurXterminator (Pixinsight plugin), which significantly improved the sharpness, but without any unrealistic artifacts.

TelescopeNewton 254/1000 mm
Aperture254 mm
Focal length950 mm
MountGemini G53f
AutoguidingZWO 174MM, TS 60/240 mm
CameraZWO 2600MM @-10°C
CorrectorMaxField coma corrector
FiltersAntlia V-Pro LRGB
ExposureL26x RGB15x 180s, Gain 100, bin 1×1,
Date2022-03-05

M66 Leo Triplet

Leo Triplet is small group of 3 galaxies. They are approximately 35 million light years from Earth. Two of them (M66 – top right and M65 bottom right) were discovered by Charles Messier already in 1780. At that time there was no light pollution, therefore these galaxies were nicely visible. Third one – NGC3628 Hamburger Galaxy (left) is dimmer, therefore was hidden till 1784. It was discovered by William Herschel and catalogued by John Louis Emil Dreyer in New General Catalogue (NGC) of deep space objects.

Image35_DBE_registered