Triangulum Galaxy at 50mm

M33, the Triangulum Galaxy, or the Pinwheel Galaxy, and its neighborhood at 50mm.

If the sky stays clear, I am going to try again tonight at 100mm. I knew nothing about this galaxy yesterday. Now I know that it is the second brightest object that we can see with our naked eyes (under extremely awesome dark sky conditions) that is outside of our own galaxy. It is 2.73 million light years away. It is the smallest member in the Local Group, which is made up of Andromeda, our Milky Way, and, of course, Triangulum. After Andromeda and the Milky Way crash into each other, in about 6 billion years, Triangulum will be pulled in by the increased gravity of the new Milkromeda (sp?) galaxy.

This image is 306 exposures at 6 seconds each, so just a bit over 30 minutes total.
50mm, f/2.8, ISO 640
Link to full-sized, 96MB file.

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