Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Crater (Crt)  ·  Contains:  HD103722  ·  NGC 3981

Image of the day 04/25/2024

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NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy, Kevin Morefield
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NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy

Image of the day 04/25/2024

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy, Kevin Morefield
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy

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Description

NGC 3981 appears to be falling apart.  The spirals arms seem to be trailing behind as it loses its structure.  The culprit that caused this havoc does not seem apparent in the field of view.  But upper right is ESO 572-23, A diffuse galaxy that appears to have a large number of globular clusters in its halo.  I'm assuming GCs here because I think this is too distant for me to resolve individual stars.  I quite like the starfield through which we see these two galaxies.  The trapezoid formed by the four brightest stars anchored my composition here.

Knowing I needed to capture the faint wisps of galaxy's arms, I went a little longer on the Luminance here.  I captured about 15 hours of L and added the L data from my 15 hours of RGB in a Super-Luminance.

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    NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy, Kevin Morefield
    Original
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    NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy, Kevin Morefield
    D

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NGC 3981 | A Beautifully Disturbed Spiral Galaxy, Kevin Morefield