Southern Sky Gallery

The Southern Sky images below were all taken by Chris Proctor from Phillip Island to the south of Melbourne, Australia, on the evening of 6th October 1999. They were taken with an SLR camera and standard lenses, guided to follow the sky using a home made, hand driven tracking mount. This allowed untrailed exposures of up to 15 minutes.

The Southern Milky Way A wide angle view of the milky way stretching from the eta Carinae nebula at bottom, through Crux to beyond beta and alpha Centauri to upper right. 14 minute exposure with a 35mm lens at f3.5 on 1600 iso film.

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Crux View of the milky way in the constellations of Carina and Crux. The eta Carinae nebula is obvious at lower left with the IC 2602 star cluster above it. To upper right the Coalsack is visible, a dust cloud obscuring the stars behind. Below the Coalsack are the stars of Crux, the Southern Cross. 2 minute exposure with an 85mm lens at f1.9 on 1600 iso film.

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Carina Close up of the southern milky way in Carina. At lower left is the eta Carinae nebula, one of the largest emission nebulae in the galaxy. The big star cluster above it is the Southern Pleiades, IC2602. Numerous other nebulae and star clusters can be identified using a star atlas. 2 minute exposure with an 85mm lens at f1.9 on 1600 iso film.

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Galactic Centre A wide angle view of the milky way in Scorpius and Sagittarius, looking directly towards the galactic centre. The centre itself is obscured by dust clouds in the galaxy's Sagittarius arm, however the bright central bulge of the galaxy is clearly visible with the dust clouds of the Sagittarius arm silhouetted in front. 14 minute exposure with a 35mm lens at f3.5 on 1600 iso film.

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Baades Window Close up of a region of the milky way near the galactic centre. In the lower centre are the open star clusters M5 and M6 in Scorpius, and in the lower right corner the red glowing gas of the Lagoon Nebula, M8 is obvious. The brightest yellow area of Milky way is Baade's Window, where the bright central bulge of our galaxy can be seen through a gap in the dust clouds in front of it. 2 minute exposure with an 85mm lens at f1.9 on 1600 iso film.

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The Magellanic Clouds Wide angle view of the Magellanic Clouds, two small galaxies orbiting our own milky way galaxy. These are the closest external galaxies and they are clearly visible to the unaided eye, appearing like detached patches of milky way. 14 minute exposure with an 35mm lens at f3.5 on 1600 iso film.

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The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) Close up of the Large Magellanic Cloud. Previously classed as an irregular galaxy, this is now often classified as a barred spiral. The central bar is obvious in the photo, with very irregular arms at either end. Pink nebulae in the arms mark massive gas clouds where new stars are forming. The largest of these, the Tarantula Nebula, is visible above the left end of the bar and is one of the largest emission nebulae known in the universe. 2 minute exposure with an 85mm lens at f1.9 on 1600 iso film.

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Zodiacal Light Wide angle view of the zodiacal light in the west after sunset, with the star clouds of the Scorpius milky way visible above. The Zodiacal light is caused by sunlit dust lying in the plane of the zodiac. The dust ultimately derives from comets and material thrown off in asteroid collisions. 14 minute exposure with an 35mm lens at f3.5 on 1600 iso film.

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