How long to image the M5 with the Unistellar Odyssey
From a Bortle 6 suburban sky, the Unistellar Odyssey needs about 39 min (592 subs of 4 s) for a solid image of the M5. A quick look takes 10 min; a showpiece 2 h 38 min. Under a Bortle 3 rural sky the solid figure drops to 28 min. At Bortle 6 the limit is a mix of skyglow and read noise. In this scope's field it fills 68% of the frame’s short side.
| Sky | Quick lookTarget obvious, still noisy | SolidClean enough to share | ShowpieceSmooth faint detail, print-worthy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bortle 1Excellent dark site | 7 min100 subs | 26 min398 subs | 1 h 46 min1,589 subs |
| Bortle 2Typical dark site | 7 min101 subs | 27 min404 subs | 1 h 47 min1,613 subs |
| Bortle 3Rural | 7 min104 subs | 28 min415 subs | 1 h 50 min1,658 subs |
| Bortle 4Rural / suburban transition | 7 min111 subs | 29 min442 subs | 1 h 58 min1,767 subs |
| Bortle 5Suburban | 8 min122 subs | 32 min485 subs | 2 h 09 min1,940 subs |
| Bortle 6Bright suburban | 10 min148 subs | 39 min592 subs | 2 h 38 min2,366 subs |
| Bortle 7Suburban / urban transition | 13 min199 subs | 53 min794 subs | 3 h 32 min3,176 subs |
| Bortle 8City | 18 min278 subs | 1 h 14 min1,109 subs | 4 h 56 min4,434 subs |
| Bortle 9Inner city | 30 min445 subs | 1 h 59 min1,780 subs | 7 h 54 min7,118 subs |
Power and kit for this session
Allowing for slewing, focusing and rejected subs, that is about 51 min of run time. The Odyssey’s battery (rated about 5 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.)
- USB power bank 20000mAh 5V 2.4AUnistellar says plain 5 V 2.4 A and warns against fast or adaptive chargers.
- red LED head torchRed light keeps your night vision; white light costs you twenty minutes of dark adaptation every time.
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Everything that fits the Odyssey →
How it frames
The M5 is 23′ across. The Odyssey frames 0.75° × 0.56° at 0.93″ per pixel, so it fills 68% of the frame’s short side.
About the M5
A bright, slightly elliptical globular in Serpens that rivals M13 and resolves into stars quickly.
NGC 5904 · Globular cluster in Serpens · magnitude 5.7 · 23′ · best in Apr, May, Jun. Reachable from mid-northern latitudes (UK, northern US, central Europe) and from the south.
Globular clusters are point sources packed tight, so they come quickly: the core resolves into stars within a handful of minutes on any smart scope. More time deepens the halo and pulls in the faint outer members. Use short subs so the core does not saturate into a white blob, and no filter.
About the Unistellar Odyssey
Unistellar’s compact 85 mm with autofocus and tiny pixels. Sharp, but the fine sampling costs time on faint extended targets. The Odyssey Pro is the same telescope with an eyepiece added, so these figures apply to both.
Fixed 4 s subs in Enhanced Vision; they cannot be changed. No filter option; Unistellar says third-party filters cannot be fitted to the Odyssey.
The Odyssey uses fixed 4 s subs, so the only levers you have are the sky you shoot from, the filter, and total time.
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 M5 from a Odyssey? Email it with your total time and sky to [email protected] and it goes here, credited.
Same target, other telescopes
- M5 with the ZWO Seestar S50: 10 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the ZWO Seestar S50 Pro: 11 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the ZWO Seestar S30: 11 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro: 12 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the DwarfLab DWARF 3: 15 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the DwarfLab DWARF mini: 10 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the DwarfLab Draco: 15 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the DwarfLab DWARF II: 34 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Vaonis Vespera II: 10 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro: 23 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Vaonis Vespera 3: 10 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2: 21 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Unistellar eQuinox 2: 9 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Celestron Origin: 5 min from Bortle 6
- M5 with the Celestron Origin Mark II: 5 min from Bortle 6