By Alyssa Michaud | 2023-04-27
![Community photo entitled by Ernest Jacobs on 04/26/2023 at Eden, NY 14057](https://earthsky.org/upl/gravity_forms/6-d184048789a60d766a02a8e43117298b/2023/05/M101-PI1-16by9Crop-04262023.jpg)
On 04/26/2023 11:00 pm by Ernest Jacobs| Eden, NY 14057
M101, also known as The Pinwheel galaxy. It is a very large Grand Design spiral galaxy located in Ursa Major (just off the end of the Big Dipper's handle). The galaxy is about 170,000 light-years across (compared to our Milky way at about 110,000 light-years across) and contains about a trillion stars. Although this is a small target for my imaging setup, the image is cropped in, but not too much. Wanted to keep some of the other small faint fuzzies in the image.
Exposure: 124 x 120 Sec for 4.13 hours total exposure, 50 Darks, 50 flats, & 50 DarkFlats
Gain/ISO: 100
Offset: 50
Camera: ZWO ASI2600MC Pro
Telescope: Explore Scientific Essential Series ED80 Air Spaced Triplet
Aperture/Focal Ratio: f/6.0
Focal Length: 480 mm
Mount: Sky-watcher USA EQ6-R Pro
(no filter)
All pre and post-processing in PixInsight. DBE, SPCC, BlurXT, NoiseXT, Histogram Transformation, StarXT, Curves, LHE, MMT, & Pixel Math