God's Window
Almost my entire flight schedule for April was cancelled due to COVID-19. With the continued cutbacks and a planned vacation week I hardly got to fly in May either. Initially I was worried that I wouldn’t have enough to do and hoped a Photoshop education course I hadn’t watched yet would help. I watched the first 15 minutes then went off to YouTube to research something the presenter said. Up popped a video that promised “Orion Nebula WITHOUT a Star Tracker or Telescope, Start to Finish, DSLR Astrophotography”. I figured it was snake oil but since I had that kind of time on my hands and can be entranced by bright, shiny things I watched it. Two months later I still hadn’t gotten back to my original Photoshop course.
Toby watched me take this photo from the back deck but still doesn’t believe it’s real. He says he’s never seen this in the sky and I must have just pretended to take the photo then ‘borrowed’ one from the Hubble space telescope. I told him the bright stars in the Hubble photos form crosses due to diffraction effects from the mounting arms of the telescope and he interrupted with, “Blah, blah, blah - whatever…” He can be a bit of a doubting Thomas.
This is a photo of Bode’s Galaxy (technically known as M81). It is the largest apparent galaxy in a galactic cluster near the Big Dipper. This photo is the result of stacking 240 30” exposures and it took 22 hours of computer time to assemble the final image. It doesn’t seem possible you should be able to see a galaxy here in Maryland due to the light pollution - the stars themselves are hard to see. Amazing, but true.
A7Riv, SEL100400GM + SEL14TC, 560mm, f/8, 240@30”, iso1600
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