How Have We Taken Milky Way Photographs?

Question

How have we taken pictures of the milky way? And what took them? Or is it an artists drawing?

Answer 1

There have been no images of the entire Milky Way galaxy as you have deduced yourself. All the images you have seen are probably either artists' rendering or images of other galaxies of the same type as ours.

You have probably seen some picture of the Milky Way galaxy that look like a hurricane right? Like the funny 'You Are Here' posters. Well it was once thought that the Milky Way galaxy was a spiral galaxy so images of other spiral galaxies like Andromeda were used to depict the Milky Way, but recent information suggests the Milky Way is actually a barred spiral galaxy... which is a galaxy with spiraling arms and a straight bar in the center. More recent 'images of the Milky Way' should show this bar in comparison to older images that don't.

Answer 2

You can go outside at night and take a picture of the Milky Way.  It's a picture from our vantage point, and looking in some direction.  You can piece together pictures to get the whole thing.

But for pictures that look down on the Milky Way, there are two approaches.  One is an artist's drawing based on data.  The best current data comes from radio and infrared surveys that can see stars through the dust and gas that is everywhere, especially towards the center of the galaxy.  With real enough data you can have a computer draw it, though i don't think we're there yet for the whole galaxy.  The other approach is to recognize that we live in a barred spiral with so many spiral arms, and find a galaxy that happens to look like that.  I've seen both approaches.  The most recent view, with central bar and just two major arms was an artists rendering based on Spitzer space telescope data.

Answer 3

yeah ive wondered that too, but i think like sometimes u can see that there is a milky way, but who knows they could look waaay different than that , they are pictures from the inside of the galaxy milky way. and this probly isnt the place to post this but this guy was asking a question about the signs that were put in farms maybe by aliens?" and then i clicked on his question and it said its not available lol so maybe "aliens" deleted it cuz they didnt want to be revealed or something

Answer 4

YOU-- can take a picture of the Milky Way (from the inside) tonight-- with a camera mounted on a friends telescope--- or even with a home-made device called a "barn-door" sky tracker--- like this one:

http://www.steveirvine.com/astro/barn_do...

Here is a picture from the inside looking toward the center--

http://www.astropix.com/HTML/D_SUM_S/MIL...

http://www.astropix.com/HTML/D_SUM_S/09_...

Answer 5

a really big mirror.

hey, humans have never even sent a probe outside the Solar System yet, so 'outside the Milky Way' is just never gonna happen.

if we COULD do it i bet we'd be surprised!  there are a number of idiosyncrasies in the Milky Way leading to hypotheses about the MW having a 'flip' ( a bent rim on one side, perhaps bent the other way on the other side?  like a fedora?) a bar (this has a good deal of support), a hula hoop (okay, I just made that up, but picture our Milky Way as a Rhythmic Gymnast using the Ribbon.  There is evidence that the MW has absorbed several smaller galaxies in the past and it left a glowing path of stars where the eaten galaxy went)

dont forget the chewy nougat center!