Messier 3 is a globular cluster in the
constellation Canes Venatici at a distance of 33,900 light-years away
from Earth with a magnitude of 6.2. It is one of the largest and
brightest globular clusters visible in the northern hemisphere, and
consists of around 500,000 stars. Globular clusters are groups of old
stars with this cluster being estimated at 8 billion years old.
Within this cluster are a known 274 variable stars – the most found
within any globular cluster.
'X' marks the location of M3.
I happened to be out viewing this
cluster as the moon was already beyond 50% so it was washing out a
lot of the stars, galaxies, and nebula in the sky. I decided on M3 as
it is one of the brightest globulars, and it was one of the few that
was above my tree line from the backyard. Considering the moon
brightness paired with light pollution I was very impressed with the
view of it through the telescope, and of course couldn't resist
getting a few images of it to stack and show off.
Given it's location along the border
of 3 constellations; Canes Venatici, Bootes, and Coma Berenices it
wasn't the easiest to find due to it's location in the sky and it's
lack of many stars visible to guide from. This was the first time I
actually used my RA and DEC dials on my EQ mount. Using the star
Arcturus as my setting star I tried it a few times with success on
each attempt making M3 land within the view each time.
M3 Globular Cluster in Canes Venatici. April 2, 2012. Also above the cluster is Galaxy NGC 5263 at magnitude 14.
This consists of 14 images at 30
seconds a piece, 10 dark frames and 20 bias frames taken on April 2,
2012. Since the temperature at night has been the same during the
last few sessions I'm able to reuse the same darks, and bias frames
each time. I planned on getting a few more dark frames while I was
out, but I had some difficulties with my polar alignment and tracking
that I was getting a lot of star trails. By the time I finally got
everything the way I needed it to be I was almost out of battery on
my camera.
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