A little about how I captured this photo of M101,
Pinwheel Galaxy: for the RGB, I spent multiple nights from my backyard (Bortle 3-4) as I did not want to spend precious time under super dark skies on capturing colors rather than capturing Luninacity for all the details to be revealed. However, I ended up capturing a few hours of Luminacity from my backyard and also a few hours of RGB from the Dark site just to compare and evaluate the impact of that extra darkness on the details we can get.
While I am providing L images taken from both Bortle 4 and Bortle 1 below for your judgment, here are my conclusions doing all the analysis:
- For Luminacity, the Bortle 1 absolutely crushed my Backyard Bortle 4, like by a lot. My total exposure time was 7 hours per location, which should be enough for a good comparison (minimum exact same processing). Right-Side from Bortle 1, Left-Side from Backyard Bortle 4
- Combining 7 hours from B1 and B4 did not help with the image quality compared to using only 7 hours from the dark site. I can tell that it slightly damaged the quality of most parts.
- As for RGB data, I did not see a noticeable value between the two locations. Of course, this is the case only when having the same luminosity (from a dark site) is used for both. Otherwise, just RGB by itself, the same conclusion as Luminacity.
- Only using Dark-SIte data, I was able to see the structure of Core of galaxy. Probably Backyard needed a lot more exposure time to get to there.
- For H filter (and kind of O filter) using 3nm filters, no meaningful difference as far as I could see with my exposure time.
It is amazing that I can access these dark sites by driving for only two hours. I can also see the structure and nebulae in that tiny galaxy. (NGC5474?)
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