Bode, his girlfriend and cigar (Maxim)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Ursa Major (UMa) · Contains: Bode's Galaxy · Cigar Galaxy · M 81 · M 82 · NGC 3031 · NGC 3034 · NGC 3077

Bode, his girlfriend and cigar

For the past two nights, we've been blessed with a beautifully clear sky. Although it was initially tainted by the setting moon, efficiently exploiting both nights resulted in productive astrophotography sessions. I used this opportunity to capture M81 Bode's galaxy and the neighboring cigar galaxy. Despite having a total of 12 hours of signal collection over two nights, it proved more challenging than expected to highlight the dusty nebulas around these galaxies, like those observed on astrobin.

The difficulty may be due to my telescope's slow f/6.4 or my developing processing skills. This endeavor hasn't yet resulted in the image I had visualized, hinting that I might need to spend double or even triple the amount of hours on the same target. Hopefully, future nights will give another shot, till then, keep exploring.

Despite the obstacles, there is satisfaction in capturing some color on the galaxy and discerning details on the spiral arms, as well as the reddish hues of hydrogen in both cigar and Bode's galaxies. I've posted a starless version of the image, highlighting the dusting more clearly.

Admittedly, it was a struggle to navigate gradients and noise. Nevertheless, I'm pleased with the progress so far and look forward to improving.

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Status	Basic success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	9434556
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
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Bode, his girlfriend and cigar

Bode, his girlfriend and cigar

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Bode, his girlfriend and cigar

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