M81 and M82 (Bodes and Cigar Galaxy)


The lower object, surrounded by blue spiral arms, is spiral galaxy M81. Above this, marked by red gas and dust clouds, is irregular galaxy M82. These two galaxies are locked in gravitational combat, as they have been for the past billion years.

This image was captured on a Canon 600D modified and CLS filter on a Skywatcher Evostar ED80, HEQ5 Pro. This consists of 52 x 3 min exposures at ISO 400, with 25 darks, 30 flats and 40 bias. Processing done in Photoshop CS6.