M81 & M82 (Leela.Astro.Imaging)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Ursa Major (UMa) · Contains: Bode's Galaxy · Cigar Galaxy · HD85458 · HD85828 · M 81 · M 82 · NGC 3031 · NGC 3034

Powered byPixInsight

M81 & M82

Powered byPixInsight

M81 & M82

These two galaxies are very frequently photographed. This image is the first time I spent a sustained number of hours on them, using a combination of filters to practice my Pixel Math. Lights were taken with 3 sets of filters: (a) a double-stacking of UHC & CLS CCD filters (the CLS CCD attenuates the UHC in the IR) to make a synthetic dual-band, (b) pure 6nm HA (albeit with an OSC camera), and (c) an L3 luminance filter.

I used an old Televue 102iis with a 0.79x flattener-reducer added (although if you pixel peep you'll see I could never get my spacing quite right). The 102iis is a slightly unusual scope in that it was designed for native BV'ing so has a shorter tube - for photography (or normal eyepiece viewing) you add an extension tube. It's a very versatile scope, but only about 100 or so were ever made!

This part of the sky is apparently rich in integrated flux nebulae (also known as IFN or 'dust' but perhaps not in the same way that Philip Pullman talks about dust in his Lyra novels!). I was curious to see if any of that would be caught in this image given the amount of exposure time, but it doesn't look like it (unless it's there but I couldn't coax it out in processing).

Cloudy Nights
ZWO ASI 294MC PRO

DSO (wide-field)

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	5916862
PixInsight job	N8LPHQ7PGP2QWHKDMBYF2JH7QDHVBHWA
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	09h55m27s.11
RA (top/left)	09h50m33s.79
RA (top/right)	09h49m39s.46
RA (bottom/right)	10h00m00s.85
RA (bottom/left)	10h01m37s.51

Dec (center)	+69°02′42″.6
Dec (top/left)	+69°48′19″.3
Dec (top/right)	+68°20′51″.10
Dec (bottom/right)	+68°16′35″.9
Dec (bottom/left)	+69°43′44″.7

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

M81 & M82

M81 & M82

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

In these collections

		...
You have no new notifications.

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

M81 & M82

M81 & M82

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

In these collections

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