I was trying to get a picture of the galaxy just to the right of center, but when the picture came out, I found I'd gotten something else I didn't expect. What's that to the left? Is it ET winging his way home? If so, now I where he lives! That's the galaxy far far away known here on earth as C12, and it's up near the end of the little dipper.  One authority who looked at this photo declared that it is a Klingon ship caught in the act of uncloaking. Captain Kirk where are you!?

Chick on the image for a close up view, and a little more definitive description.

Picture details

500 sec exposure, 800 ISO, about 72deg F
Canon 300D DSLR camera
Scope = 260mm diam x 1200mm FL, Schmidt Cassegrain style
Single shot, jpg format, no digital development except cropping and resizing to fit screen
Mount = Meade LX200 tracking scope, auto guided, on polar aligned wedge and stock tripod
Comments: Light pollution typical for semi rural location. The long exposure and fairly high temperature meant that quite a few warm pixels were becoming saturated, and the overall noise was starting to build up. The elongated and flared stars on the left side are from the effects of a focal reducer. They were getting beyond the in-focus zone of the scope and FR.