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Object Type: Spiral galaxy (Sb)
Constellation: Canes Venatici
Magnitude: 8.6
Size: 10' x 6'

M63 is 37 million light-years from our solar system, and is notable for the prominent dust lanes in its disk, which give rise to its common name of the Sunflower Galaxy.

Equipment: Meade 14" LX200R/ST-10XME/Astro-Physics CCDT67 telecompressor/Astrodon LRGB filters/Paramount ME
F-ratio: f/6.5
Exposures: LRGB:  L 16 x 5 minutes, binned 2x2: R 16 x 5 minutes: G 16 x 5 minutes: B 16 x 5 minutes: RGB binned 3x3
Date: April 13, 2007 and April 25, 2008
Location: Landers, California, USA
Technical Notes: Individual expsoures were dithered using CCDAutoPilot2 and then sigma combined. Contrast adjustments were made in Photoshop CS with Levels and Curves. The RGB images were combined in Registar 1.0. The luminance image was sharpened with a High Pass Filter using a Radius of 4 pixels, and selectively applied using a Layer Mask. A Gaussian Blur of 1 pixel was applied to the RGB image and to the dim portions of the luminance image. The RGB image was duplicated and the resulting layer combined using Soft Light to enhance color.