Yet another galaxy pic

[robj144]

Started this last night:



Whirlpool galaxy.

[Dru Edwards]

Cool! I had to Wiki the Whirlpool Galaxy. 31 million light years away - that's quite the road trip.

[robj144]

Originally Posted by Dru Edwards

Cool! I had to Wiki the Whirlpool Galaxy. 31 million light years away - that's quite the road trip.

Thanks Dru. It is and who knows if anything is there.

[Dru Edwards]

Originally Posted by robj144

Thanks Dru. It is and who knows if anything is there.

There are 100 billion stars in that galaxy... gotta be something out there posting Milky Way images on their version of the AGF .

[TBman]

Originally Posted by Dru Edwards

There are 100 billion stars in that galaxy... gotta be something out there posting Milky Way images on their version of the AGF .

And there are billions of galaxies...... Ow, my head hurts....

[Dru Edwards]

Originally Posted by TBman

And there are billions of galaxies...... Ow, my head hurts....

It's mind boggling. The estimate is about 200 billion galaxies. And then add in a few hundred million (or billion) stars per galaxy ... wow.

[rmp]

Woa,, that is NICE!

[Chickee]

Robj144,
When you say you “started this last night” what exactly does that mean? When is the photograph finished?
Thanks, frankie d.

[robj144]

Originally Posted by rmp

Woa,, that is NICE!

Thank you.

Originally Posted by Chickee

Robj144,
When you say you “started this last night” what exactly does that mean? When is the photograph finished?
Thanks, frankie d.

I combine 100's of pics usually over the course of two, to as many as, five nights to build up the picture.

[Slothead56]

Originally Posted by Dru Edwards

It's mind boggling. The estimate is about 200 billion galaxies. And then add in a few hundred million (or billion) stars per galaxy ... wow.

Amen.

I don’t necessarily buy that here are little green men checking us out but we would be fools to think that there is not intelligent life somewhere in those billions and billions of solar systems.

It is mind boggling.

[robj144]

I'm fairly convinced that just in the pics I've posted here in which I have posted about 20 different galaxies or so, their is intelligent life somewhere in those pics. That's on the order of about 2 trillion stars and probably around a trillion solar systems with trillions of planets.

The odds of winning Powerball is about 1 in 300 million. If the same odds apply to intelligent life, that's somewhere around 3000 intelligent species in those photos if only 1 trillion planets are present. There might be 5 trillion planets in those photos.

But, even if there are 1 trillion planets, and the odds of intelligent life are 10 times less than winning the lottery, there's at least 300 civilizations in my pics.

And, they're 40+ million light years away. Even if they have a 20 million year head start on us, we would have no idea for another 20+ million years.

[Tyeetime]

Very cool.

Why does it take several days to photograph?

[robj144]

Originally Posted by Tyeetime

Very cool.

Why does it take several days to photograph?

They're dim so they need a lot of exposure time and it helps to kill the noise in the image.

[fumei]

I have probably observed M51, aka NGC 5194, aka Whirlpool Galaxy, hundreds of times using various telescopes. I am very curious - what is your focal length for that? And how much is the full image cropped?

By the way, that is the best shot of M51 I have seen in a while.

Congratulations!

[jontewright]

Superb and simply mind blowing!

Thank you for sharing, the sheer vastness of space and the possibilities of what may be ‘out there’ literally blows my mind and has been the topic of many a late night conversation over the years.