M44 - Praesepe (Beehive Cluster)

M44 is an open star cluster in the constellation Cancer approximately 610 light-years from our sun.  As one of the closest star clusters to Earth it has been recognized since Roman times. It is relatively young, like most open clusters, at 600 million years and spans about 15 light-years with about 1000 stars. Its location in the night sky at halfway between Gemini and Leo makes it a very popular object for astrophotographers in the Northern hemisphere during spring time. The large yellow red-giants make a pleasant contrast to the more abundant brighter hot blue main sequence stars. Also scattered in this image are very tiny galaxies which if you look closely can detect. One such galaxy, PGC24400, is located in the lower central portion of the image and there are at least five others scattered throughout.

I really like clusters but you would never know it since I rarely do them. In fact I have only done this once before over five years ago - this image is far superior to that image. So I did not originally intend on doing 7.5 hours for this cluster but am glad I did. The moon was out for part of it and I was also doing other objects which were not up yet so it was very convenient.

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M44 - Praesepe (Beehive Cluster)
Dates: 3-29, 3-30, 4-3, 4-4, 4-5, 4-6
Camera: ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro
Telescope: Astro-Tech AT115EDT 115mm Refractor Telescope
Barlow: None
Focal Length: 805mm
f/7
Focal Reducer: 0.8x AstroTech Field Flatterner/Focal Reducer
Mount: Orion Sirius
Filter Wheel: ZWO EFW 8 x 1.25"
Filter: ZWO L, R, G, B
Focuser: ZWO EAF
Autoguiding: ASI120 Mini attached to an Agena 50mm Guide Scope/ZWO 60mm Guidescope
Exposure: L 168 x 60, R 94 x 60, G 91 x 60, B 96 x 60
Gain: 139
Offset 21
Temp: 5 C
Processing: NINA, PixInsight, Photoshop, Topaz DeNoiseAI.

https://https://www.instagram.com/astroquest1/
http://astroquest1.blogspot.com/
https://www.astrobin.com/users/kurtzepp/collections/
http://youtube.com/c/AstroQuest1