The Pleiades by Harry Page

The Pleiades in the constellation Taurus, the Bull, is the finest open cluster in the entire sky and very possibly the best deep sky object of all. Also known as Messier 45 or the Seven Sisters, it is an easy naked eye object even in light-polluted skies and a magnificent sight in binoculars. Most people can see six pleiads from suburban skies and seven members from darker, rural sites. When it comes around again in early autumn see how many you can see.

This is a magnificent, very deep, wide field image of M45 looking perhaps like you've never seen it before. Modern imaging equipment, techniques coupled to powerful processing routines have transformed amateur astro-imaging with many familiar looking deep sky objects totally transformed, helping further our understanding of the astrophysical processes that have made them what they are.

Harry Page shot this with his Takahashi Epsilon 180ED hyperbolic astrograph operating at f/2.8 with a Starlight Xpress SXVR H35 CCD camera and loadstar guider. He accumulated 580 minutes of luminance data and 240 minutes of RGB (red, blue and green) data, all in five-minute subs. Processing was handled by PixInsight.

Submit your photo to our Picture Gallery by emailing it to: gallery2014(at)astronomynow.com The very best pictures will appear in our magazine or online.