Astronomy Adventure – The Pleiades

Let’s take a quick break from the insanity that is the Trump administration and escape from the Earth altogether. It has been a pretty dreadful month or so for any astronomy as the sky is continually overcast and the few clear nights we’ve had have always conflicted with other responsibilities. But I finally did get out there for a couple of hours earlier this week before the clouds rolled in again.

Here is a photo of the Pleiades, easily the easiest and most recognizable open cluster to view with the naked eye and identified by cultures all over the world since antiquity and beyond. The name of the cluster as well as the names of nine individual stars within it comes down to us from the Greeks. In 1771, Charles Messier included it as the 45th object in his catalog of comet-like objects, hence the alternative title for the cluster of Messier 45 or, simply, M45.

Here are the technical details for those handful who might be interested:
Scope: Starblast 4.5; tracking on, but clearly not perfectly polar aligned
Magnification: 20x
Camera: iPhone6 using NightCapPro app; ISO 1600
Processing: 5×15 sec. images stacked in Deep Sky Stacker; no flats or darks; adjusted curves using GIMP