M81 and M82

The spring brings out some great galaxies. This is the first iteration of a long-term project I'll be working on with respect to these two galaxies.

M81 is on the right, lies around 11.7 million light years away and harbors around 250 billion stars. M82, on the left,  is also called the "Cigar Galaxy" lies at about the same distance as M81. The two galaxies are seperated by about 150,000 light years.

Image Details:

* Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes 80mm ED Refractor

* Imaging Camera: Nikon D7000

* Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval Refractor

* Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot AutoGuider

* Mount: Celestron CGEM

* Exposures: 9 * 8 minute lights, 9 * 8 minute darks, 30 bias frames

* ISO 1000

* Aligned and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

* Post-Processing Dynamic Photo HDR, LightRoom and Photoshop.

M81"Bode's" & M82 "Cigar" Galaxies

We had four hours of clear skies last night here in Central Texas, and after putting the kids to bed, and despite being very tired, I headed out to my new dark sky spot to catch some photons. I wanted to go for more Horsehead data but decided to shoot these two galaxies instead. I had the CGEM set up in about 25 minutes and got stuck into it. Again, the trend of improvement continues as this is a better shot than my attempt last year. The Nikon D7000's live view is really helping me with focus, and my drive was tracking away nicely.

I've stretched the image as much as I can without it becoming "fake-looking". The light pollution is still so-so, so maybe next weekend I can try this out at a much darker site, as well as the Horsehead. I'd also like to try and get the Rosette Nebula but that may be pushing it.

Click on the image above for the full view.

• 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: 8 * 10 minute lights
• ISO 640
• Aligned and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
• Post-Processing in GIMP (contrast, saturation and unsharp mask)
• Noise Reduction in NeatImage

M81 & M82

Okay, so this is my first attempt at M81 and M82 using long exposures and guiding. The post-processing is rough, and I tweaked with it for HOURS. Still not happy with the result. I think the problems with this photo are:

1. Not in focus. I should have slowed down on Friday night and "focused" on "focusing"! ;-) As a result, it's not as sharp as it could be by a long shot.
2. Stars are too bright and "burned out" in my opinion. But I couldn't decrease star brightness without decreasing the nebulosity of the galaxies. Very annoying.
3. There is still a digital feel to this image. I'm trying to get a nice, glossy image and seem to be far from that. Not sure how to do that.

Having said that, it's a vast improvement on my attempt from last year and definitely a step in the right direction. You can clearly see the spiral arms of the main galaxy and there's some nice color there too.

Image Details:

• Imaging Scope: AstroTelescopes 80mm ED Refractor
• Imaging Camera: Nikon D40
• Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval Refractor
• Guiding Camera: Meade DSI-C
• Mount: Celestron CGEM
• Exposure Time: 1 hr 20 mins (8 * 10-minute exposures)
• ISO400
• Aligned and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
• Post-processing in GIMP
• Noise reduction in NeatImage

Brief Observing Session - April 21, 2009

Having an oh so joyful day at work today, I decided to take the Lightbridge out to the local observing spot instead of stay at home and write research papers. I needed to chill! The night was warm and a bit humid, and the sky was very clear indeed. Seeing was maybe 3/5, there was something high up in the atmosphere which gave stars a blurry appearance. Even my binoculars picked this up.

Anyway, I targeted some galaxies tonight, primarily. I started off with the familiar sight of M81 and M82. Even in the local, light-polluted skies they appeared bright and stood out clearly from the dark background of space. I could see a little bit of detail in the Cigar galaxy, but not too much. I then went onto the M51 "Whirlpool" galaxy, and could only really discern its two central bulges, like two grey eyes looking back at me. I also found the Leo Triplet which are a group of galaxies I have not observed often but need to pay moe attention to. I managed to get all three in the field of view of my Panoptic 22mm, and it was a pleasant sight.

I also checked out the Owl Nebula, and spent some time observing Saturn. I could see a fair amount of surface coloring, and the rings looked elegant as they appeared to pierce the plant through its center. There was a very small level of tilt to the rings that I could observe, as well as maybe three moons.

I was only out for about 1.5 hrs before I felt too tired and needed to come home. Still, it was nice to be under the stars again - it had been a while.

I also took my DSLR and tripod and experimented around a little bit. I took the image below of the Auriga constellation, which consists of around 18*25 second exposures at F5.6, ISO800. I pointed out some of the neater features of the constellation as well.

Click on image for full size

Autoguiding - M81 & M82 Galaxy Group

Tonight was a very nice night! 5/5 transparency and 4/5 seeing - these nights are too rare, sadly. I took the LX200 out to the local observing spot and set it up for autoguided running...

I spent the better part of last night working out how to use my new Meade DSI with the freeware PHD Guiding software, as well as learning how to let PHD Guiding drive my LX200. It took most of the night last night, mainly due to having to figure out how to set up and configure the Meade ASCOM drivers needed for the software to communicate with my scope. (ASCOM is a recent standardized method for PC->telescope communications).

So, it took me about 1.5 hours to figure out the configuration when I was out in the field tonight. My laptop was certain another application was connected to the scope and would not allow me to connect to it via the guiding software. I managed to locate the process (MeadeETXDriver) and kill it, and then was able to connect successfully.

So, below is my first autoguided image attempt. The image is cropped a fair bit. Nice roundish stars, could be better but I'll take it. (Side note - the stars in my recent images seem to be burned or really bright, not sure why...) This is the M81/M82 galaxy group near Ursa Major. M81 is the bigger galaxy that shows some spiral structure. M82, or the "Cigar Galaxy" is the brighter, thinner object above M81. The fainter blob to the left is yet another galaxy - NGC3077, which I was surprised to see once my images were processed!

I'm happy with this shot. When I attempt this next, it will be far away from light polluted skies...

Image Details:

• William Optics 66mm Petzval with Nikon D40 DSLR
• Guided by Meade 8" LX200 with Meade DSI, mounted on Milburn wedge
  
• 8*3 minute exposures @ ISO800
• 2*3 minute darks
• 6 * flat frames
  
• Registered and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
• Mild noise reduction in NeatImage
• Subtracted Gaussian blur layer to try to remove light pollution
  

Click on image for full size

Test Photo: M81 & M82

Below is JUST a test shot. I wanted to test the field of view of my Nikon D40 with William Optics 66mm on these two galaxies. So, this is shot is just 5 * 30 second exposures at ISO 1600, taken while they were only about 25 degrees above the horizon. Both can clearly be seen, more detail in Bode's Galaxy but so-so. A longer image taken later in the year should yield a nice result.