Perseus at 50mm

After a Thanksgiving Day of clouds yesterday, I happened to glance at my Clear Skies app and saw that the skies would clear at 8:00PM, so I jumped into my new Carhartt insulated overalls and headed out. It was warm enough that I didn’t need the overalls, but they were comfortable. I was concerned about the ground fog, but the stars above were burning bright.

I turned my attention to the constellation Perseus, which just about filled the frame of my 50mm lens. Just to the right at the bottom of the picture is The Pleiades, which are tiny in comparison to mighty Perseus. In fact, this image is only just slightly cropped, to take off the very edges where there were stacking artifacts. I learned a few new tricks in post-processing this one. I am not 100% happy with it, as it seems to have picked up a greenish tinge when I had to convert to 16-bit from 32. Overall, it is a step in the right direction.

Lifted from Wikipedia:”Perseus is a constellation in the northern sky, being named after the Greek mythological hero Perseus. It is one of the 48 ancient constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy, and among the 88 modern constellations defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). It is located near several other constellations named after ancient Greek legends surrounding Perseus, including Andromeda to the west and Cassiopeia to the north. Perseus is also bordered by Aries and Taurus to the south, Auriga to the east, Camelopardalis to the north, and Triangulum to the west. Some star atlases during the early 19th century also depicted Perseus holding the disembodied head of Medusa, whose asterism was named together as Perseus et Caput Medusae; however, this never came into popular usage.
The galactic plane of the Milky Way passes through Perseus, whose brightest star is the yellow-white supergiant Alpha Persei (also called Mirfak).
In Greek mythology, Perseus was the son of Danaë, who was sent by King Polydectes to bring the head of Medusa the Gorgon—whose visage caused all who gazed upon her to turn to stone. Perseus slew Medusa in her sleep, and Pegasus and Chrysaor appeared from her body. Perseus continued to the realm of Cepheus whose daughter Andromeda was to be sacrificed to Cetus the sea monster.
Perseus rescued Andromeda from the monster by killing it with his sword. He turned Polydectes and his followers to stone with Medusa’s head and appointed Dictys the fisherman king. Perseus and Andromeda married and had six children. In the sky, Perseus lies near the constellations Andromeda, Cepheus, Cassiopeia (Andromeda’s mother), Cetus, and Pegasus.
In Neo-Assyrian Babylonia (911–605 BC), the constellation of Perseus was known as the Old Man constellation (SU.GI), then associated with East in the MUL.APIN, an astronomical text from the 7th century. “

I then hopped across to The Pleiades and from there, climbed down the sky to Aldebaran. I never knew that Pleiades was part of Taurus before. I am sure there is some kind of story there.