A fantastic selection of deep sky objects taken by Danny Pearce.
M101 – The Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as NGC 5457) is a face-on, counter clockwise intermediate spiral galaxy located 21 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major.
Danny used a FRA400 and PlayerOne585MC with a UV/IR cut filter to acquire the image. 380 x 60secs subs were captured but many were infected by clouds and so ended up taking the best 180 or so. Stacked and processed using PixInsight.
M51a – The Whirlpool Galaxy (also known as NGC 5194) is an interacting grand-design spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici. It was the first galaxy to be classified as a spiral galaxy and is 31 million light-years away. Its companion is called M51b or NGC5195.
Taken on 12/04/26 from Dartford. Danny used an HEQ5 mount with a Skywatcher150PDS scope and PlayerOne585MC colour camera with a UV/IR cut filter. Exposures were all 60 sec length and Danny took 180. Stacked with Flats and Bias frames and processed in PixInsight.
M3 (also known as NGC 5272) is a globular cluster located 33.9 thousand light-years away in the constellation Canes Venatici.
This image was also taken by Danny on 12/04/26 from Dartford, using an HEQ5 mount with a Skywatcher150PDS scope and PlayerOne585MC colour camera with a UV/IR cut filter. Exposures were all 60 sec length and Danny took 72. Stacked with Flats and Bias frames and processed in PixInsight.