NGC6946, the Fireworks Galaxy

Fireworks Galaxy and Flying Geese Cluster
NGC6946 and NGC6939 — the Fireworks Galaxy and the Silk Fan Cluster

NGC6946 is dim. I only had about three hours total exposure; it would be better with twice that. Unfortunately, the weather is sketchy, and I probably won’t be able to collect those photons any time soon.

Stellarium has several fanciful names for NGC6939 — the “Ghost Bush Cluster”, the “Flying Geese Cluster”, and the “Silk Fan Cluster”. I prefer “Silk Fan Cluster”.

This image was cropped to balance the two objects. A closer crop of the galaxy shows lots of potential, but it would take time and good conditions to do it justice:

NGC6946

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