EarthSky Community Photos

Submit your photo here. Comment or upvote on photo pages. Search via photographers' names. More improvements coming! To help, please donate.

Stéphane Picard
Quispamsis, New Brunswick, Canada
10/02/2022
08:20 pm

Equipment Details:

Canon T1i with 300 mm lens. F5.6 ISO 3200. 60 frames at 10 seconds each.

Post-processing Details:

Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker with 20 darks and 20 flats. Processed in PhotoShop and LightRoom.

Image Details:

Double Cluster in Perseus (NGC 869 & NGC 884).
Both clusters are situated in the Perseus OB 1 association. At a distance of about 7000 light years, the clusters are only a few hundred light-years apart. They are both quite young, with NGC 869 being 5.6 million years old and NGC 884 at 3.2 million years old. Their hottest main sequence stars are of spectral type B0. By comparison, the Pleiades have an estimated age ranging from 75 million years to 150 million years.
Both clusters are also blue-shifted, with NGC 869 approaching Earth at a speed of 22 km/s and NGC 884 approaching at a similar speed of 21 km/s.

2024 EarthSky Fundraiser

Any amount will help us reach our goal.

Would you consider

donating?

If you've already donated, we apologize for the popup and greatly appreciate your support.