Description (wikipedia)Messier 81 (also known as
NGC 3031 or
Bode's Galaxy) is a
grand design spiral galaxy about
12 millionlight-years away in the
constellationUrsa Major. It has a
D25 isophotal diameter of 29.44
kiloparsecs (96,000
light-years). Because of its relative proximity to the
Milky Way galaxy, large size, and
active galactic nucleus (which harbors a 70 million
M☉supermassive black hole), Messier 81 has been studied extensively by professional
astronomers. The galaxy's large size and relatively high brightness also makes it a popular target for
amateur astronomers. In late February 2022, astronomers reported that M81 may be the source of
FRB 20200120E, a repeating
fast radio burst.
Personal NoteI had some serious problems with gradient removal of the red master frame. There was a dark halo around the galaxy that was very difficult to remove. Redid my flats twice witht he same result. Maybe to do with the combination of a very bright object in the center and an otherwise dark field. Still struggling a bit with adding Ha.. The IFN came out nicely ;-)
ProcessingChrominance: WBPP, autocrop, DBE, Linear Fit, RGB combination, Background Neutralisation, Photometric ColorCalibration, Deconvolution, Maskstretch, ArcsinhStretch, denoise, Local Histogram Transformation, curves, HDR-MT
Luminance: WBPP with 2xdrizzle, DBE, Deconvolution, denoise, Histogram Transformation, Curves, denoise, HDRM MST
Comments