M81 & M82

[glennbech]

Hi!

This is the result of my longest imaging session so far. This is the result of 6 hours of 10 minute subs. I've stacked them and drizzled 2x, processed the images in the larger format and resized them later.

I had to remove a blue gradient in Pixinsight LE (the moon IS in the way nowdays!). My flats came out this time, and light leaked onto my darks (I had to re-use old ones). So, I might try to restack later. I havn't touched my scope & camera since the imaging session .

Seeing wasn't all that good.

I think M82 is very special. It's one of the strangest things up there

Thanks for looking!

Wide field

Closeup M82

Closeup M81

[MikeWilson]

What's a 2x drizzle? Your images are exceptionally clear, by the way! I quite like way M82 has come across with clear dust lanes all the way towards the core.

[glennbech]

Thanks for the comment. I was kind of hoping for more detail, but the Canon 10D + 500 mm of my megrez 90, limits how "up close" I can get.

Drizzle means that the slight errors in alignment between subs are used to improve the details in the image. The process is probably best described here;

I might try later with the 0.8 reducer removed, but then I have to cope with a scope at f/7 instead of f/5. (Not a bad Idea actually!) :-)