The Big Picture

Here's something fun to play with. Called "The Big Picture," it's a zoomable wide-field visible light survey of part of the Virgo cluster of galaxies. Unlike most large three-color images, this one is NOT a mosiac, but instead was taken in "drift mode" at the Palomar Observatory - the telescope points at a place in the sky to start and then stays fixed in where it's pointing (relative to the ground) as the sky rotates past. However, a physical mosaic version of it's been installed in the newly reopened Griffith Observatory.