How long to image the Bode's Galaxy with the Vaonis Vespera II
From a Bortle 6 suburban sky, the Vaonis Vespera II needs about 1 h 04 min (383 subs of 10 s) for a solid image of the Bode's Galaxy. A quick look takes 16 min; a showpiece 4 h 15 min. Under a Bortle 3 rural sky the solid figure drops to 25 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 fills 31% 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 | 5 min33 subs | 22 min130 subs | 1 h 26 min519 subs |
| Bortle 2Typical dark site | 6 min35 subs | 23 min138 subs | 1 h 32 min550 subs |
| Bortle 3Rural | 6 min38 subs | 25 min152 subs | 1 h 41 min608 subs |
| Bortle 4Rural / suburban transition | 8 min47 subs | 31 min188 subs | 2 h 05 min751 subs |
| Bortle 5Suburban | 10 min61 subs | 41 min244 subs | 2 h 43 min976 subs |
| Bortle 6Bright suburban | 16 min96 subs | 1 h 04 min383 subs | 4 h 15 min1,530 subs |
| Bortle 7Suburban / urban transition | 27 min162 subs | 1 h 48 min647 subs | 7 h 11 min2,585 subs |
| Bortle 8City | 44 min264 subs | 2 h 56 min1,056 subs | 12 h4,223 subs |
| Bortle 9Inner city | 1 h 20 min483 subs | 5 h 21 min1,929 subs | 21 h7,716 subs |
Power and kit for this session
Allowing for slewing, focusing and rejected subs, that is about 1 h 23 min of run time. The Vespera II’s battery (rated about 4 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 February night.)
- USB-C PD power bank 20000mAh 30WOnly four hours inside; Vaonis specifies a 30 W PD source. C-to-C cable not included.
- Vaonis Vespera hygrometer sensorTriggers the built-in demister automatically; the correct dew accessory for the II.
- 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 Vespera II →
How it frames
The Bode's Galaxy is 27′ × 14′ across. The Vespera II frames 2.55° × 1.44° at 2.39″ per pixel, so it fills 31% of the frame’s short side.
Longer subs
10 s subs by default; Expert Mode manual targets allow 1 to 30 s. Alt-azimuth only, no EQ mode. Time for a solid image by sub length:
| Sub length | Bortle 3 | Bortle 5 | Bortle 7 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 s | 25 min152 subs | 41 min244 subs | 1 h 48 min647 subs |
| 20 s | 22 min66 subs | 37 min112 subs | 1 h 44 min313 subs |
| 30 s | 21 min42 subs | 36 min72 subs | 1 h 43 min206 subs |
About the Bode's Galaxy
A big, bright grand-design spiral that circles the pole for northern imagers, so it is available all year. Shares a frame with M82.
M81, NGC 3031 · Galaxy in Ursa Major · magnitude 6.9 · 27′ × 14′ · best in Jan, Feb, Mar. Reachable from mid-northern latitudes (UK, northern US, central Europe) and from the south.
Galaxies are broadband targets: their light is mostly starlight spread across the spectrum, so a dual-band filter throws most of it away and makes things slower, not faster. Shoot without a filter (or with a plain UV/IR cut) and rely on total time and a dark sky. The core of a galaxy is usually many times brighter than its outer disc, so a short stack shows the nucleus long before the arms; the figures here are for the arms and disc, not the core.
Field rotation in Alt-Az mode crops the edges of the stack over a long session, so on a big galaxy re-centre now and then or use EQ mode where your scope supports it.
About the Vaonis Vespera II
A 50 mm quadruplet on an 8 MP sensor with Vaonis’s mosaic mode for wide fields. Same optics class as the Seestar S50, four times the pixels.
10 s subs by default; Expert Mode manual targets allow 1 to 30 s. Alt-azimuth only, no EQ mode. Optional clip-on Vaonis filters: dual-band, light-pollution (CLS) and solar; the app detects which is fitted.
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 Bode's Galaxy from a Vespera II? Email it with your total time and sky to [email protected] and it goes here, credited.
Same target, other telescopes
- Bode's Galaxy with the ZWO Seestar S50: 1 h 04 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the ZWO Seestar S50 Pro: 1 h 10 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the ZWO Seestar S30: 1 h 07 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro: 1 h 14 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the DwarfLab DWARF 3: 1 h 33 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the DwarfLab DWARF mini: 1 h 03 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the DwarfLab Draco: 52 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the DwarfLab DWARF II: 3 h 37 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Vaonis Vespera Pro: 2 h 23 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Vaonis Vespera 3: 1 h 01 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2: 2 h 16 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Unistellar eQuinox 2: 58 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Unistellar Odyssey: 4 h 25 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Celestron Origin: 17 min from Bortle 6
- Bode's Galaxy with the Celestron Origin Mark II: 23 min from Bortle 6
All telescopes for the Bode's Galaxy · All targets for the Vespera II