Draco Triplet + Astrodoc Ron Brecher + RGB

Draco Triplet

Credits: Astrodoc Ron Brecher

Filters: Optolong RGB filters

 

 

 

The three main galaxies in this image, from left to right, are NGC 5985, NGC 5982, and NGC 5981. They are at quite different distances, and appear close only due to being along the same line of sight. This field is located in the Draco constellation, the Dragon.

Farthest of the three, at 140 million light years, is NGC 5985, an active (Seyfert) spiral galaxy. It is about a third larger than our Milky Way and shows the most detail among the Triplet members.

NGC 5982 doesn’t show much detail, but does seem to exhibit some concentric shells, which could indicate a long-past merger with another galaxy. It is about 130 million light years away.

The nearest of the three Triplet members, NGC 5981, is another spiral galaxy, this time oriented edge-on from our line of sight. Its dark dust lanes are easily visible. It’s ‘only’ about 112 million light years from Earth.

There are dozens of other galaxies in this image, all much farther away. This annotated version without stars, makes it easy to see the galaxies in the image. NGC, IC and PGC galaxies are marked and labelled. However, there are many more unlabelled galaxies that aren’t in these often-referenced galaxy catalogues.

 

 

 

Tekkies:

Acquisition, focusing, and control of Paramount MX mount with N.I.N.A., TheSkyX. No guiding. Primalucelab low-profile 2″ Essato focuser, ARCO rotator and Giotto flat panel. Equipment control with PrimaLuce Labs Eagle 4 Pro computer. Guided with OAG and PHD2. All pre-processing and processing in PixInsight. Acquired from my SkyShed in Guelph. Average transparency and average or better seeing. Acquired under little or no moon illumination from June 7-20, 2026. 

Celestron 14″ EDGE HD telescope at f/11 (3,931 mm focal length)  and QHY600M-SBFL camera binned 2×2 with Optolong RGB filters.

57 x 5m Red = 4hr 45m
55 x 5m Green = 4hr 35m
57 x 5m Blue = 4hr45m

Total: 14hr 05m

Hope you like it.