Date: July 16, 2010 1:05am

Location: Victoria Centre Observatory, Observatory Hill, Victoria, BC, Canada

The vast Andromeda spiral galaxy is the largest member of our Local Group of galaxies. It has two small neigbouring galaxies, as well as some knots of star forming regions which appear as small blue coloured clouds in this photo. The dark lanes in Andromeda are quite distinct.

Imaging
Camera: Hutech-modified Canon T2i dSLR utilizing an IDAS UIBAR-III filter
Telescope/Mount: Tele Vue NP127is apo refractor on a Paramount ME EQ mount, unquided
Exposures: 26x2min light frames; 15 dark frames
ISO: 1600

Processing

ImagesPlus 3.82a x64: Debayer colour using Capture WB; Calibrate lights with darks; Normalize; Grade; Align; Combine (Excluded Min/Max Average). Digital Development: modest contrast stretch, colour correction applied, crop image, save to 48 bit TIFF.

ACDSee Pro 3: Convert 48 bit TIFF to 24 bit jpg.