Observation by David Davies: M61, NGC 4303

Uploaded by

David Davies

Observer

David Davies

Observed

2022 Apr 01 - 23:15

Uploaded

2022 May 10 - 11:31

Objects

M61
NGC4303
NGC4292

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Constellation

Virgo

Field centre

RA: 12^h21^m
Dec: +04°29'
Position angle: -1°51'

Field size

0°29' × 0°22'

Equipment

8-inch Ritchey Chretien
ASI 294MC Pro camera
SW EQ8 mount

Exposure

50 x 2-minutes

Location

Cambridge, UK

Target name

M61

Title

M61, NGC 4303

About this image

I have found M61 to be quite a challenging target for my 8-inch telescope. With an integrated magnitude of 9.7 and 6' x 6' in size, the bright core contrasts with the quite faint spiral arms which hold lots of intriguing detail. Once again, I've used my ASI 294MC Pro camera and seem to have overcome my initial difficulties in achieving an acceptable colour balance using this camera.

I've made a number of changes to my image processing workflow and now use Pixinsight for image calibration, registration and stacking. Following debayer, I split the RGB components from the one-shot colour camera and process the colour components separately. before finally linearising, realigning and combining them to a composite linear colour image for colour calibration. Although protracted, the process helps to eliminate some of the artefacts on star images from the camera Bayer matrix.

Files associated with this observation

M61_LRGB-web.jpg (913.5 kB)

Like this image

Mark Fairfax, Callum Potter, David Basey, Nick Hewitt, Mr John William Hughes, Simon Paul Davis, Mike Greenhill-Hooper

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