The camera was piggybacked to a telescope with an equatorial mount. This allows the camera to track along with the movement of the sky and keep the stars in focus. In order for that to work, the telescope mount has to be leveled and carefully aligned to the north celestial pole. I just eyeballed the alignment to the North Star, so the stars are slightly smudged in this shot.
They're all stars except for the smudge above and to the right of the Andromeda Galaxy, which is a smaller satellite galaxy. Bit of trivia- at about 2.2 million light years away, this is the most distant object most people can see with the naked eye.
Message edited by author 2007-09-11 13:56:13. |
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