M-31 the Great Andromeda Galaxy
M-31 is THE picture galaxy! Just about everyone has seen pictures of this galaxy. It is the largest galaxy we can see from Earth and it is the only one that can be seen easily without any visual aid. It appears as a faint fuzzy patch in semi-dark skies. Surprisingly it is not an easy photographic target; at least not easy to get an image as pretty as the ones we have all seen. It is LARGE! It is as big as 5 full moons placed end-to-end! Without visual aid we only see the bright core. It takes a wide field telescope or 300-600mm telephoto camera lens to get it fully on the frame. M-31 is flanked by two satellite galaxies; M-32 above its center and M-110 below and a bit farther away.
This image is a composite of 4 color photos; 2-E200 and 2-PPF. This composite was then added to a Tech Pan B&W image. All exposures were for 1 hour. The photographic instrument is a Takahashi BRC 250 astrograph.