M74 - Spiral Galaxy

M74 is a Grand Design Sc-type Spiral Galaxy in the constellation Pisces.  Its distance is estimated to be about 35 million light years.  More information about this galaxy can be found at The Messier Index - M74 and Wikipedia - M74.

This image is a 126-minute (63 x 2-min) composite captured on 31 October 2008 through a William Optics FLT-110 4.3" f/7 refractor with an SXV-H9 CCD camera.

Faintly visible in the image above and more pronounced in the version below are two streaks.   These are asteroids or minor planets that were slowly moving through the field during my imaging run.   The one to the left of the galaxy is designated 18300 1979 PA while the one to the lower right of the galaxy is 8000 Isaac Newton, which is a Main-belt asteroid discovered in 1986.   The total imaging run was just short of 3 hours from 0239-0534 UT on 1 November 2008.