How long to image the Orion Nebula with the Celestron Origin Mark II
From a Bortle 6 suburban sky, the Celestron Origin Mark II needs about 6 min (38 subs of 10 s) for a solid image of the Orion Nebula. A quick look takes 2 min; a showpiece 25 min. Under a Bortle 3 rural sky the solid figure drops to 5 min. At Bortle 6 the limit is skyglow, so a darker site or a filter helps more than longer subs. In this scope's field it is 1.9× wider than the frame.
| Sky | Quick lookTarget obvious, still noisy | SolidClean enough to share | ShowpieceSmooth faint detail, print-worthy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bortle 1Excellent dark site | 2 min10 subs | 5 min30 subs | 15 min90 subs |
| Bortle 2Typical dark site | 2 min10 subs | 5 min30 subs | 15 min90 subs |
| Bortle 3Rural | 2 min10 subs | 5 min30 subs | 15 min90 subs |
| Bortle 4Rural / suburban transition | 2 min10 subs | 5 min30 subs | 15 min90 subs |
| Bortle 5Suburban | 2 min10 subs | 5 min30 subs | 16 min96 subs |
| Bortle 6Bright suburban | 2 min10 subs | 6 min38 subs | 25 min151 subs |
| Bortle 7Suburban / urban transition | 3 min16 subs | 11 min64 subs | 42 min255 subs |
| Bortle 8City | 4 min26 subs | 17 min104 subs | 1 h 09 min416 subs |
| Bortle 9Inner city | 8 min48 subs | 32 min190 subs | 2 h 07 min760 subs |
Power and kit for this session
Allowing for slewing, focusing and rejected subs, that is about 8 min of run time. The Origin Mark II’s battery (rated about 6 h) should cover it; a power bank still keeps the phone running the app alive. (Bortle 6, solid image; we allow 30% over the integration time, and 30% off the battery for a December night.)
- portable power station 300W AC outletRuns the supplied 12 V adapter off-grid; dew shield and heater are built in.
- red LED head torchRed light keeps your night vision; white light costs you twenty minutes of dark adaptation every time.
- hand warmers long lastingAir-activated packs give hours of heat for the person; winter nights are long and you spend most of them standing still.
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Everything that fits the Origin Mark II →
How it frames
The Orion Nebula is 85′ × 60′ across. The Origin Mark II frames 1.32° × 0.75° at 1.23″ per pixel, so it is 1.9× wider than the frame. A mosaic, or choosing the part you want and letting the rest go, is how it gets shot on this scope.
Longer subs
10 s auto subs (15 s with the Nebula Filter); manual 1 to 30 s on the alt-az mount, longer only with the EQ wedge, and 60 s and up needs the StarSense Autoguider too. Celestron warns the f/2.2 optics saturate quickly without the filter. Time for a solid image by sub length:
| Sub length | Bortle 3 | Bortle 5 | Bortle 7 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 s | 5 min30 subs | 5 min30 subs | 11 min64 subs |
| 15 s | 8 min30 subs | 8 min30 subs | 11 min43 subs |
| 30 s | 15 min30 subs | 15 min30 subs | 15 min30 subs |
With and without the dual-band filter
| Filter | Bortle 3 | Bortle 5 | Bortle 7 |
|---|---|---|---|
| No filter | 5 min30 subs | 5 min30 subs | 11 min64 subs |
| dual-band (Nebula Filter), drawer | 5 min30 subs | 5 min30 subs | 5 min31 subs |
The Origin Mark II has no built-in dual-band filter. Filter drawer takes 1.25-inch or 2-inch filters, including dual-band; Celestron sells an optional Nebula Filter. On an emission target like this it is the single biggest upgrade you can make.
About the Orion Nebula
The brightest nebula in the northern sky and the one every smart scope gets pointed at first. The core saturates in a minute; the wings and the Running Man need real time. Mix short and long stacks.
M42, NGC 1976 · Emission nebula in Orion · magnitude 4.0 · 85′ × 60′ · best in Nov, Dec, Jan. Reachable from mid-northern latitudes (UK, northern US, central Europe) and from the south.
Emission nebulae glow in a few narrow lines, mostly hydrogen-alpha (deep red) and doubly ionised oxygen (teal). A dual-band filter passes those lines and blocks most skyglow, which is why it cuts the time needed from a suburban sky so dramatically. Use it. From a genuinely dark site the gain is smaller because there is less skyglow to block, and read noise becomes the limit, which is where longer subs (EQ mode, or Expert Mode on a Vespera) earn their keep.
Stars lose colour through a dual-band filter; a short broadband stack blended in fixes that if you care.
About the Celestron Origin Mark II
The Origin Mark II (late 2025): the same 6-inch f/2.2 RASA with an 8 MP IMX678 in place of the original 6 MP IMX178. Smaller pixels for finer detail, a quieter sensor, and still the fastest system here by a wide margin.
10 s auto subs (15 s with the Nebula Filter); manual 1 to 30 s on the alt-az mount, longer only with the EQ wedge, and 60 s and up needs the StarSense Autoguider too. Celestron warns the f/2.2 optics saturate quickly without the filter. Filter drawer takes 1.25-inch or 2-inch filters, including dual-band; Celestron sells an optional Nebula Filter.
Longer subs matter most under dark skies, where read noise rather than skyglow sets the floor. From a city the difference between 10 s and 30 s subs is small; from a rural site it can halve the total time, especially with a dual-band filter in place.
Stack across nights. Every smart scope app can continue a stack or you can combine the saved frames on a computer; the figures here are totals, not single-session limits.
Have an image of the Orion Nebula from a Origin Mark II? Email it with your total time and sky to [email protected] and it goes here, credited.
Same target, other telescopes
- Orion Nebula with the ZWO Seestar S50: 12 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the ZWO Seestar S50 Pro: 14 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the ZWO Seestar S30: 14 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro: 15 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the DwarfLab DWARF 3: 16 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the DwarfLab DWARF mini: 12 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the DwarfLab Draco: 15 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the DwarfLab DWARF II: 57 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Vaonis Vespera II: 17 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Vaonis Vespera Pro: 38 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Vaonis Vespera 3: 16 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2: 36 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Unistellar eQuinox 2: 15 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Unistellar Odyssey: 1 h 08 min from Bortle 6
- Orion Nebula with the Celestron Origin: 5 min from Bortle 6
All telescopes for the Orion Nebula · All targets for the Origin Mark II