Cigar Galaxy
M82, better known as the Cigar Galaxy, is located about 12 million light-years from earth. Around the galaxy’s center, young stars are being born 10 times faster than they are inside our entire Milky Way galaxy. The rapid rate of star formation in this galaxy eventually will be self-limiting. When star formation becomes too vigorous, it will consume or destroy the material needed to make more stars. The starburst will then subside, probably in a few tens of millions of years.
January 29, 2025
Once again, continuum subtraction was somewhat difficult for this image, so I opted to create a Foraxx Palette with with the dual band data and simply combine it with the RGB data. I think it came out pretty nicely. The Antlia OAG performed excellently as well. I set the guide camera to Bin2, so guide stars were much more prominent in the guiding FoV. As a reference, for M81 RGB data, I was guiding between .6”-.7” RMS most of the night, but last night I was between .4” and .7” RMS most of the night, and it even dipped into the .2-.3”RMS range on a few occasions. Of course, numbers aren’t everything, the results are what’s important. And the result here is that I have overall better subs and I can be even more selective with the subs I use for integration, which of course results in a better final image.
Now that I’ve had a test run on processing M81 and M82 individually, I’m going to get to work on the mosaic that includes both.
Technical Details
Imaging Telescope: Orion Optics UK Ideal 8
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI533MC Pro
Mount: Sky-Watcher EQ6-R Pro
Filter: Antlia Tri-band RGB Ultra Filter - 2” Mounted; Antlia ALP-T Dual Band 5nm 2”
Accessories: ZWO ASIAIR Plus, ZWO EAF, ZWO Filter Drawer (Gen 2), Antlia OAG with Filter Drawer
Software: PixInsight, Starnet, BlurXterminator, GraXpert, SetiAstro Automatic DBE, SetiAstro Statistical Stretch, SetiAstro Continuum Subtraction Utility
Guiding Telescope: SVBony SV106 60mm Guide Scope
Guiding Camera: ZWO ASI174MM
Imaging Dates: January 14 and 28, 2025
Frames (gain 101.0) f/4.9 -10c: 160x180” (8h) Dual Band; 170x180” (8.5h) Triband
Integration Time: 16.5h
Darks/Flats/Dark Flats: 60/60/60
Bortle Dark-Sky Scale: 6.00