The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB) (James Hawks)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Canes Venatici (CVn) · Contains: IC 4277 · IC 4278 · M 51 · NGC 5194 · NGC 5195 · Whirlpool Galaxy

Powered byPixInsight

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

Powered byPixInsight

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51a) and its companion M51b, are ~31 million and ~25 million light years away respectively. The Whirlpool Galaxy is an interacting grand-design spiral galaxy with a Seyfert 2 active galactic nucleus in the constellation Canes Venatici. It was the very first galaxy to be classified as a spiral galaxy.

This 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 HA 3nm filters. It was captured over 9 nights (2023-03-27 to 2023-04-17). The images were stacked/processed in Pixinsight and fine-tuning done in Photoshop.

Acquisition:
   Location: Queen Creek, AZ Bortle 7/8
   Dates: 2023-03-27 to 2023-04-17
   Lights (Dithered, Cooled -15°C, Gain 100):
       250 x 60s L
       50 x 300s R
       50 x 300s G
       50 x 300s B
       70 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
   Mount: GM2000 HPS II
   Filters: Antlia VPRO LRGB, HA 3nm

Software:
   NINA
   Pixinsight
   Photoshop

Processing:
   Stacked in Pixinsight (WBPP, SubframeSelector, ImageIntegration)
   Pixinsight (DCrop, DBE, BlurXterminator, NoiseXterminator, ChannelCombination, BGNeutralization, SpectrophotometricCC, SCNR, LRGBCombination, GeneralizedHS, StarXTerminator, GeneralizedHS Staturation, PixelMath(+HA))
   Photoshop (AstroFlat Pro, HighPass, Image Brightness/Vibrance/Saturation)

N.I.N.A. Users
Skywatcher Esprit ED Super APO Triplet
Arizona Astrophotographers
ZWO ASI2600MM Pro

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	7800431
PixInsight job	PU6DAXCNZ7HHYKG09LAAAV7CD3CSRS82
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	13h29m55s.500
RA (top/left)	13h31m03s.203
RA (top/right)	13h30m57s.390
RA (bottom/right)	13h28m46s.770
RA (bottom/left)	13h28m53s.409

Dec (center)	+47°11′34″.71
Dec (top/left)	+46°52′14″.68
Dec (top/right)	+47°31′32″.73
Dec (bottom/right)	+47°30′52″.69
Dec (bottom/left)	+46°51′37″.61

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

		...
You have no new notifications.

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

The Whirlpool Galaxy - M51a (HaLRGB)

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

Notifications

AstroBin is in READ ONLY mode

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Are you really sure?

Warning!

Warning!

Are you sure?

Report abuse

Slideshow settings

IOTD/TP stats (last [x] days)

Distribution of astrophotographers

Distribution of subject types

Distribution of data sources

Sorry

Sorry

Share

Upload new revision

Upload uncompressed source (XISF/FITS/PSD/TIFF)

Delete image and all its revisions?

Delete original image?

Delete all other versions?

Delete all revisions?

IOTD/TP stats

The following people like this image

The following people bookmarked this image

Warning

Flag malfunctioning thumbnails

Contains

Remove yourself as a collaborator

Plate-solving information