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For this rendition of this lovely face on spiral, I combined minutes of Hydrogen Alpha data to slightly enhance the visibility of the the numerous HII regions across the disk. With my new camera, for the first time, I can now fit the entire galaxy on to the image, and show the full extent of this object. This face on spiral galaxy in Ursa Major lies only a few degrees from the handle of the Big Dipper asterism, and is so large it fills the field of the CCD. A yellow core of population 1 stars, is surrounded by the blue population 2 arms, dotted with hundreds of hydrogen clouds recorded here as a brilliant pink.

Instrument:  12.5" f/5 Home made Newtonian
Platform:  Astrophysics 1200 QMD
CCD Camera:  SBIG ST8i NABG with Enhanced Cooling
Guider: SBIG ST4
Exposure:  LHaRGB = 60:50:20:20:40 (RGB Binned 2x2)
RGB Combine Ratio:  1: .8: 1.2
Filters:  RGB Tricolor, CS 3nm Ha
Location:  Payson, Arizona
Elevation:  5150 ft.
Sky:  Seeing FWHM = 4.0 arcsec (Maxim DL - 10min subframe), Transparency 6/10
Outside Temperature:  20 C
CCD Temperature:  -20 C
Processing Tools:  Maxim DL, RG Sigma, Photoshop, AIP4WIN, PW Pro, RW Debloomer.

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