M81, also known as Bode's Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy located \~12 million light-years away in the constellation of Ursa Major. Discovered by German astronomer Johann Elert Bode in 1774, this cosmic island is roughly 90,000 light-years in diameter—comparable in size to our own Milky Way—and is home to over 250 billion stars. It is a popular target of astrophotographers for its pristine, sweeping spiral arms filled with hot, blue, star-forming regions and dust lanes that wind directly down into a bright, compact core. At the very center of its active galactic nucleus lies a supermassive black hole weighing roughly 70 million solar masses.
This HaLRGB image was captured in a Queen Creek (Arizona) Bortle 7/8 backyard using a Skywatcher Esprit 150ED telescope. The telescope is mounted on a 10Micron GM2000 HPS II mount. The camera is a ZWO ASI 2600MM Pro using Antlia VPRO LRGB and 3nm HA filters. It was captured over 28 nights (2022-12-24 to 2024-05-11). The images were captured using NINA and stacked/processed in PixInsight.
* Location: Queen Creek, AZ Bortle 7/8 * Dates: 2022-12-24 to 2024-05-11 * Lights (Dithered, Cooled -10°C, Gain 100): * 1025 x 60s L * 100 x 300s R * 100 x 300s G * 100 x 300s B * 100 x 600s HA * Bias: 200 * Flats: 25 Each Filter
Hardware:
* Camera: ZWO ASI 2600MM PRO * Scope: Skywatcher Esprit 150ED * Focuser: FocusCube2 * Guide Camera: ASI 174mm Mini * Guide Scope: ZWO OAG-L * Rotator: Falcon V2 * Mount: GM2000 HPS II * Filters: Antlia VPRO LRGB, 3nm HA
Software:
* NINA * PixInsight
Processing:
Dynamic Crop, Gradient Correction, Channel Comb, SPCC, BlurXterminator, NoiseXterminator, Stat Stretch, HA Comb, Saturation, L Sharpening, LRGB Comb #space