M61

[dcrowson]

M61 (NGC 4303, UGC 7420 and many others) is a seyfert 2 galaxy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seyfert_g ... t_galaxies) located approximately 54 million light-years away in Virgo.

NGC 4301 (NGC 4303A, UGC 7439 and others) is the somewhat odd spiral at the top left.

NGC 4292 (UGC 7404 and others) is spiral at the top right. This one reminds me of M77 or M94 – both galaxies with a bright core and a faint ring of outer arms.

Luminance – 24x600s – 240 minutes – binned 1x1
RGB – 8x300s – 40 minutes each – binned 2x2

360 minutes total exposure – 6 hours

Imaged February 1st, 17th, 18th and 24th, 2020 from Dark Sky New Mexico at Rancho Hidalgo (Animas, New Mexico) with a SBIG STF-8300M on an Astro-Tech AT12RCT at f/8 2432mm.

LRGB -



Dan

[Hankmeister3]

Beautiful capture and nice framing. Thanks for posting, Dan.

[MariusD69]

Looks amazing! Well done!

[mbocca]

Dan,

I really like the detail you were able to capture as well as the framing. The framing really makes the image.

Mike

[drock]

Very nice. Thanks for sharing.

[Kanadalainen]

This outstanding... thanks Dan. What is your processing workflow/software?

Thanks.. I'm just about 2 meters into the rabbit hole and digging.

[Dragonsfire]

Nice capture

[kt4hx]

Excellent image Dan. I really like how you captured the bar and even minute traces of the dark lanes lining the leading edge of the bar. The bright HII region at the northeastern edge of the bar stands out wonderfully as well. Nicely done.

[Gordon]

Congratulations Dan on winning todays TSS APOD!!!

https://www.theskysearchers.com/app.php ... of-the-day

[Makuser]

Hello Dan. A superb M61 spiral galaxy image from you here. Very nice contrast an wispy arm details. Thanks for sharing this capture with us on here Dan, and congratulations on winning the TSS APOD Award.

[helicon]

Congrats Dan. That image rocks! A well deserved APOD win for you!

[Greenman]

Great work Dan!

[ic_1101]

Beautiful crisp detailed image Dan and congrats on the TSS APOD!

[dcrowson]

This outstanding... thanks Dan. What is your processing workflow/software?

I do fairly minimal processing. I stretch the L and RGB and then combine in PhotoShop. I tend to do some kind of saturation / match color and then star and noise reduction. I like to tell people I spend a good 10 minutes but it tends to be closer to 5. I'm sure there is more to pull out but I don't like to do a lot of selective processing and I haven't spent the time to learn PixInsight.

Dan