Messier 83, the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy

Messier 83 or M83, also known as the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy and NGC 5236, is a barred spiral galaxy approximately 15 million light-years away. It is one of the closest and brightest barred spiral galaxies in the sky. (NASA Science)

Image processed by Andrew Macica, original data from Telescope Live.

Imaging Details:

Observatory: Rio Hurtado Valley, Chile

Telescope: Planewave CDK24

Aperture: 610 mm (24 inches), f/6.5

Focal Length: 3962 mm

Camera: FLI PL 9000 CCD

Filters: LRGB

Total Exposure: 15 hours 50 min.

Image Processing: PixInsight 1.8.9-3 Ripley (x64)

Adobe Photoshop 12.5.1

Adobe Lightroom Classic 14.1.1

Instruction on PixInsight from Adam Block Studios.

Part of my goal was to compare the capabilities of a CMOS verses CCD camera. This image was done with an older model CCD camera. The 2024-12-31_M83_DRZ_LRGB image was done with a current model CMOS camera. So imaging the same object using the same telescope. I prefer the results with the CMOS camera. With less total exposure time the CMOS camera produced more detail and structure.