Unsharp-masked V band image obtained from optical data acquired at the ESO/MPI 2.2 m telescope with the WFI; North is up, and east to the left. The white bar indicates a 10′′ length. The inner dust lane at the center of NGC 3311 is about 2′′ wide and 7′′ long (Laine et al. 2003), and is embedded within a central light excess of about 16′′ in diameter, where bright knots are visible here and in the HST image of Laine et al. (2003).