Double Cluster & Muscleman 18/11/04 - Eric Walker

I took this at 1940h UT on 18.11.04 using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 with settings 41.14sec, fl=71.2mm, f/4.2, ISO 200. The image quality setting was RAW so that I maximised the data within the image which I could work with. The camera was piggy-backed to my scope and used a motorised drive to prevent star-trailing. I also took a 50 second "darkframe" image and subtracted it from the original using Adobe Photoshop CS to remove any brightly coloured "hot pixels" and the "amp-in" area of the CCD. The darkframe corrected image was further processed using Adobe Photoshop CS and the stars and their colours have come out well. The Double Cluster in Perseus consists of NGC 869 (upper cluster) and NGC 884 (lower cluster) to the right of this image. Following the chain of stars extending from the left of NGC 869 leads to the open cluster Stock 2 which forms an upright stick figure with flexed arms that is responsible for its nickname the Muscleman Cluster. www.astrophotos.plus.com