M4 - Star Cluster (James Hawks)

Celestial hemisphere: Southern · Constellation: Scorpius (Sco) · Contains: M 4 · NGC 6121

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M4 - Star Cluster

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M4 - Star Cluster

M4 is a large globular cluster located in the constellation Scorpius. M4 is approximately 7200 light-years away and it is the closest globular cluster to Earth. M4 was discovered by Philippe Loys de Chéseaux in 1745 and catalogued by Charles Messier in 1764. M4 was the first globular cluster in which individual stars were resolved. M4's central mass measures about 8 light years in diameter, but its full reach is 75 light years across. On top of that, its gravitational influence stretches for about 140 light years.

This unguided image was captured, in a Queen Creek (Arizona) Bortle 7 backyard, using a Celestron EdgeHD 11" telescope with a 0.7x focal reducer. The telescope is mounted on a 10Micron GM2000 HPS II mount. The camera is a ZWO ASI 2600MC Pro using a Astodon OSC UV-IR Cut filter. The image is comprised of 325 (only top 50% used), 120 second exposure length frames, captured over 7 nights (4-01-2022 to 4-08-2022). The images were stacked and processed in Pixinsight, and fine-tuning done in Photoshop.

Acquisition:
Location: Queen Creek, AZ Bortle 7
Date: 2022-04-01 to 2022-04-08
Lights (Dithered, Cooled 0°C, Gain 100):
325 x 120s (top 50% used)
Darks: 25
Flats: 25
Dark Flats: 25

Hardware:
Camera: ZWO ASI 2600MC PRO
Scope: Celestron EdgeHD 11"
Focal Reducer: Celestron 0.7x
Focuser: Prodigy Microfocuser
Guide Camera: Unguided
Guide Scope: Unguided
Mount: GM2000 HPS II
Filter: Astrodon OSC UV-IR Cut

Software:
SGP
Pixinsight
Photoshop

Processing:
Stacked in Pixinsight (WBPP, Split RGB, SubframeSelector, ImageIntegration)
Pixinsight (ChannelCombination, DCrop, ABE, EZDenoise, MaskedStretch, EZStarReduction))
Camera Raw Filter in Photoshop
AstroFlat Pro
Color/Levels Adjustments

N.I.N.A. Users

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	5698257
PixInsight job	9WAYF1MG7W4QNBEDVLOR0PMZ3Y7K0SPJ
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	16h23m34s.560
RA (top/left)	16h22m37s.747
RA (top/right)	16h22m37s.511
RA (bottom/right)	16h24m31s.716
RA (bottom/left)	16h24m31s.265

Dec (center)	-26°31′46″.27
Dec (top/left)	-26°12′43″.94
Dec (top/right)	-26°50′50″.97
Dec (bottom/right)	-26°50′49″.70
Dec (bottom/left)	-26°12′43″.32

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M4 - Star Cluster

M4 - Star Cluster

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M4 - Star Cluster

M4 - Star Cluster

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