C70
Galaxy in Sculptor
About
NGC 300, the Sculptor Pinwheel, is a spiral galaxy seen nearly face-on about 6 million light-years away. At roughly 94,000 light-years across it is somewhat smaller than our own, and it outshines the other four large spirals toward the Sculptor Group.
Imaging tips
- About 19′ by 13′, so 1,250–2,080 mm on APS-C frames the disk.
- Faint at 23.8 mag/arcsec², so plan many hours of broadband data: a published image of the clusters in its arms used over 20 hours.
- Face-on, with its blue star clusters spread across the whole disk, so a frame wide enough for the full disk keeps them all.
- Best in September and October, but it stays below 3° altitude from 50°N, so it belongs to southern skies.
Facts
- Size
- 19.4′ × 13.1′
- Magnitude
- 9.2
- Coordinates
- RA 0h 54.9m, Dec −37° 41′
- Framing, APS-C
- 1250–2080 mm
- Framing, full frame
- 1910–3190 mm
- Best months
- Sep, Oct
- Peak altitude
- 2° from 50°N, 17° from 35°N