Needle Galaxy (NGC 4565)

NGC 4565, known as the Needle Galaxy, is an elegant spiral galaxy seen edge-on, located in the constellation Coma Berenices. It lies approximately 40 million light-years from Earth and is one of the best examples of a spiral galaxy viewed from the side.

The galaxy looks like a thin, bright line with a central bulging core and a dark dust lane cutting through its center – it is precisely this contrast that earned it its fitting name. From our perspective, we don't see the spiral arms directly, but this "side profile" is exactly what makes it unique.

Acquisition

I took a little break from nebulae and tried to photograph a galaxy. In my opinion, galaxies are harder to edit compared to nebulae, and the processing workflow is different. I originally photographed Bode's Galaxy as well, but I couldn't manage to process it nicely. Instead, I decided to go for the Needle Galaxy. It is indeed smaller, and a larger telescope would be useful here. My old Celestron would probably have yielded better detail, but I decided to give it a try anyway. I created this image after about 10 days throughout February 2025. By the way, you can see a bunch of other small galaxies in the photo that might look like stars at first glance. 😉

Acquisition took place on these nights: Feb 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24

Once again, everything was captured using N.I.N.A and PHD2

Processing

The classics: DSS, PixInsight, and GraXpert. The Starless image was created via Starnet again.