Saturday, March 24, 2012

M101 "Pinwheel" Galaxy



This is my first attempt at M101. This galaxy is approximately 2 million light years away and is part of the "M101 Group" of galaxies.

It's okay, I should have taken more exposures. This would also be better imaged through a scope larger than 80mm. Looks like I captured lots of other fuzzballs here so I'll submit it to Astrometry and see what they are!

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes 80mm ED Refractor
- Imaging Camera: Nikon D7000
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval Refractor
- Guiding Camera: Meade DSI-C
- Mount: Celestron CGEM
- Exposures: 7 * 12 minute lights, 6 * 12 minute darks
- ISO 800
- Aligned and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Post-Processing in GIMP (contrast, saturation and unsharp mask)
- Noise Reduction in NeatImage
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1 comment:

  1. RoryG10:45 PM

    Very nice, Phil! M101 is a tough target, or at least it was for me. You did a good job bringing out the details!

    ReplyDelete

G'day there!

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Phil