110 Galaxies in One Image

Image Captures 110 Galaxies, Star Clusters and Nebulae in a Breathtaking Mosaic

An astrophotographer spent more than 352 hours capturing images of the sky to create a spectacular mosaic of all 110 celestial objects in the Messier's catalog.

According to Ambassador Arjan, quoted by Space, Cornelis van Zuilen, an amateur astrophotographer, has prepared a stunning mosaic of all 110 galaxies, star clusters and nebulae in the Messier list; A huge project that took hundreds of hours and he spent many nights sleeping in his car to complete it.

One of the first objects in the Messier catalog that I photographed was Messier 45 or the Parvin cluster, Van Zwielen said in an email to the Space website. This happened in 2024; When I had just bought my cooling astro camera and had just started my journey into the world of astrophotography of deep sky objects. He added: About a year and a half ago, I decided to photograph all the objects in this list.

Van Zuylen took a total of 352 hours and 13 minutes to photograph this diverse collection of deep sky objects. For this, he used two telescopes "Oscar 103APO" and "William Optics Redact 51 MK2.5" and then carefully edited the images of each mass with the help of Photoshop software and PixInsight astronomical software.

Van Zuylen observed and photographed many of these objects from the balcony of his house in the city of Hailo in the Netherlands. However, in order to record images of some other objects, he had to move his telescopes to other places so that the trees and buildings of the farms are not in the field of view of the camera.

He said about the difficulties of this project: It was really challenging to do this work from the Netherlands. I often had to go to a semi-dark plain near where I live to have an open view of the horizon. This meant many nights sleeping in the car. But to be honest, I really enjoyed that part too; Because it felt like camping.

Messier's list was first compiled in the 18th century by Charles Messier, a French astronomer. According to NASA, his goal was to compile a list of deep-sky objects that could be mistaken for comets due to their glow in the night sky.

This list has been revised several times since its creation and includes some of the most famous deep-sky objects visible from the Northern Hemisphere.

Among these objects, we can mention the Andromeda galaxy named Messier 31 (M31), the Parvin open star cluster named Messier 45 (M45) and the Orion Nebula named Messier 42 (M42).

Each of the objects on this list can be seen under the right conditions, i.e. under a dark sky, using an ordinary home telescope. This feature has made Messier's list a popular astronomical tourism list among amateur astronomers; A list that enthusiasts can follow to discover wonders beyond the solar system.

"As you may have noticed, some of the images in this mosaic are larger than others, and there's a reason for that," Van Zuylen says. They are my favorite pictures! Most of them have a personal story behind them; Stories about how they were recorded that make this collection more personal and meaningful to me.