Higher-resolution versions:  1280 x 1024  1680 x 1050  1920 x 1200  2004 x 1336 (luminance)  2004 x 1336 (negative)

More than 500 galaxies have been catalogued in the Perseus Galaxy Cluster, which is located about 250 million light-years from our own galaxy. Its brightest members are NGC 1275 (magnitude 11.6), near the right edge of the image, and NGC 1272 (magnitude 12.0), located to the left of NGC 1275. NGC 1275 is a strong source of radio waves and x-rays. In the higher-resolution images, red filaments can be seen extending from the center of the galaxy.

Equipment: Meade 14" LX200R/STL-11000M/Astrodon LRGB filters/Paramount ME
F-ratio: f/9.5
Exposures: LRGB: L 18 x 30 minutes, binned 2x2: R 12 x 10 minutes: G 12 x 10 minutes: B 12 x 10 minutes: RGB binned 3x3
Date: November 2, 3, 9, and 10, 2007
Location: Landers, California, USA
Technical Notes: Individual exposures were obtained using CCDAutoPilot2 and then sigma combined. The RGB image was created in Registar 1.0. Mild gradients were removed with Russell Croman's GradientXTerminator plug-in for Photoshop. A high-pass filter with a radius of 4 pixels was applied to copy of the luminance image. A Gaussian Blur of 1 pixel was applied to the RGB image and the dim portions of the luminance image. A duplicate of the RGB image was combined using Soft Light to increase color saturation.