M101 In Ursa Major - Posted April 7, 2006

A big beautifully strucutured spiral galaxy located just off the handle of the Big Dipper. M101 is so big that I can't fit the whole of it in one shot when using the LX200 @ F6.3. Obviously it fits easily into the field of view of the Tak 60, so I was excited to try it. I was hoping to get more detail and am a little disappointed that I couldn't. After initial processing, I shot more luminance on another night hoping I could bring out more detail, but to no avail. I tried lots of different sharpening tools in different software products, but just couldn't get what I was after. I'm toying with the idea of shooting more LUM with the LX200 and adding that in as luminance to improve detail.