• M 51 in Canes Venatici, the Whirlpool Galaxy
    • M51
    M51 Annotated image
  • M51, NGC 5194 and NGC 5195, or the Whirlpool
  • Galaxy in Canes Venatici was the first to be
  • classified as a spiral galalxy.  Located
  • 23.5 Mly from us, M51 is 76.9 kly across.
  • Hover over the picture for an annotated version
  • Date:  10 and 11 May 2026
  • FOV:  approximately 30' × 20'; the major axis of M 51 is 11.2' × 6.9'
  • Rotation:  90.029°
  • Telescopes:  Orion Apex 127mm Mak-Cass (1382mm,
  • nominally 1540mm, f/12.1) and
  • Celestron 9.25" EdgeHD 925 SCT (1632mm, f/7
  • with Celestron 0.7× reducer)
  • Guiding:  ZWO ASI120MM mini mono guide cameras,
  • SVBony SV165 Mini 40mm f/4 guide scopes
  • Computers:  ASIair pro and ASIair plus 256GB Raspberry Pi
  • Mounts:  ZWO AM5 (Mak-Cass) and AM7 (C-925)
  • Cameras:  ZWO ASI071MC pro, -10°C, OSC, gain 90 (2026) or
  • gain 240 (2022)
  • ZWO ASI6200MC pro (APS/c), -10°C, OSC, gain 100
  • Filters:  none (Mak-Cass) and Optolong UV/IR cut (C-925)
  • Frames:  55 frames over two nights with the Mak-Cass and
  • 35 frames on 10 May 2026 with the C-925 Edge HD
  • Stacking:  ninety 300 second frames using PixInsight
  • Total Time:  7 hours 30 minutes
  • Processing:  Pixinsight – DBE, SPCC, DynCrop, BlurXT, NoiseXT,
  • MultiScaleAdaptiveStretch → Stars, GHS, Sat
  • StarXT, MAS, MStr, GHS, HST, MAS,
  • PixelMath Add 0.25(MAS, MStr, GHS, HTS),
  • HDRMST66PhLm, Sat → Starless
  • PixelMath ScreenBlend(Stars, Starless), Scale
  • Location:  Darling Hill Observatory near Vesper, NY