M51 reprocessed; must be cloudy again

[Shibby]

This is actually the second time I've reprocessed this, having neglected to save my work last time before an ill-timed Photoshop crash!

It's a 50% crop, the framing is slightly awkward but I wanted to fit in the nice fuzzies near the bottom. There are plenty of other (albeit smaller) fuzzies scattered around, too.

I haven't quite figured out why my stars came out so much tighter than is usual for my setup. Perhaps they are just fainter?

It is 25x5min + 15x5m Ha (not loads but does help a bit) with my 450D at ISO-800 from SGL7!

[Gina]

That's superb - great image

[sologuitarist61]

Fantastic image Lewis, bet you are pleased with that!! :laugh:

[farunj]

Wow!! That's really beautiful!

[SJJ]

Nice one. Love the Ha regions coming out in M51.

[Quatermass]

Great shot of a lovely galaxy.

[Delboy_Hog]

That's beautiful, thanks for sharing!

[Willarnold]

Fantastic image!

[HnrKS]

Nice. Great job, Lewis.

[BigBlueOne]

Smashing image Lewis.

[Anweniel]

I love M51 and you have done the whirlpool real justice there, really looks great. Even got some little friends coming through underneath

[Shibby]

Thanks all for your comments. On second looks, I think I may have lost a little detail in M51 itself in this version...

However, I was looking at some of the background fuzzies and noticed a grouping to the left-hand side of the image, so I downloaded "Aladin" and it turns out to be (the catchily-named) galaxy cluster WHL J133218.3+470937. Not the best capture, I'm sure, but it's fun to hunt around your image to see what you've picked up

[Uranium235]

Nice work Lewis, I liked the colour on your version so I had a bash at adding a CCD luminence layer to bring out those dust lanes a bit more.

[Austin]

Nice one! Love it

[Gina]

That is truly brilliant - I love it

[Shibby]

That worked a treat Rob, much finer detail! Let me know if you want the stacked output. Having said that, it's worked rather well with the jpeg!

[davestorey]

impressive image. :-)