Getting to know the Nordkuppel

Getting to know the Nordkuppel

On the 3rd of December 2013 I was fortunate enough to have the University of Vienna's 0.8m Nordkuppel telescope all to myself for a night. Before the humidity rose beyond acceptable levels (80%), I managed to take pictures of M33, the Triangulum Galaxy in the R, V and H alpha bands as well as the SII and OIII bands. The first 3 images showed quite a lot of detail, while the later two weren't exposed long enough to reach a usable signal-to-noise ratio.

M33 - The Triangulum Galaxy

The red and green channels are used for the R and V images, while the blue channel shows the H alpha emission. As H alpha traces the excited gas, it can be used as an indicator for recent star formation. The youngest stars are blue, hence why I used the blue channel to show where these star forming regions are located. The dust lanes in the spiral structure is also visible as dark patches in the otherwise yellow background of field stars

M15 - Globular Cluster

In the final 15 minutes of my observation time, I swung the telescope around to look at the M15 globular cluster. This image was taken in V band.