M35 is the spangle of bluer stars towards the top and left. It is a cluster about 800pc distant. The smaller cluster to the lower right (NGC 2158) contains many more redder stars. It is older than M35 and about 6 times more distant. The photometric data from which this picture was produced were used to support an astrometric calibration of Fine Guidance Sensors #3 and 1R aboard Hubble Space Telescope.

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Fritz Benedict and David Chappell acquired these data at McDonald Observatory (October 21, 1995), using a 30" telescope and wide-field CCD camera. The picture is a combination of three exposures, each through a blue, green, or red filter. Randy Whited processed and combined the images to make the final color picture.