NGC 6946 is a face on galaxy in Cygnus known as the
Fireworks Galaxy because so many supernovae
occur there. It is 25.2 Mly from us and contains
just under 100 billion stars.
Hover over the picture for an annotated version
Date: 26 September 2024
FOV: cropped to 54' × 36'; the long axis of NGC 6946 is about 11.4'
Telescope: Orion 127mm Mak-Cass (1540mm, f/12.1)
Guiding: ZWO ASI120MM mini mono guide camera,
SVBony SV165 Mini 40mm f/4 guide scope
Computer: ASIair pro Raspberry Pi
Mount: ZWO AM5
Camera: ZWO ASI071MC Pro Cooled (-10°C) Color CMOS with gain 90
Filter: none
Stacking: one hundred and one 240 second frames using Pixinsight
Total Time: 6 hours 44 minutes
Processing: Pixinsight – SPPC, DBE, SPCC, BlurXT, NoiseXT, DynCrop → Linear
MStr, GHS, HST, PMath MStr + GHS + HST → Stars, Sat,
StarXT, MStr, GHS, HST, PMath MStr + GHS + HST → Starless,
HDR8466PhLm, Sat, PMath ~(~Stars*~Starless) → Blend, scale
Location: Stony Creek Boat Launch near Henderson, NY
