How long to image the M87 with the Unistellar eQuinox 2
From a Bortle 6 suburban sky, the Unistellar eQuinox 2 needs about 56 min (838 subs of 4 s) for a solid image of the M87. A quick look takes 14 min; a showpiece 3 h 43 min. Under a Bortle 3 rural sky the solid figure drops to 33 min. At Bortle 6 the limit is a mix of skyglow and read noise. In this scope's field it fills 23% 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 | 8 min117 subs | 31 min466 subs | 2 h 04 min1,863 subs |
| Bortle 2Typical dark site | 8 min120 subs | 32 min477 subs | 2 h 07 min1,908 subs |
| Bortle 3Rural | 8 min125 subs | 33 min499 subs | 2 h 13 min1,995 subs |
| Bortle 4Rural / suburban transition | 9 min138 subs | 37 min551 subs | 2 h 27 min2,204 subs |
| Bortle 5Suburban | 11 min159 subs | 42 min634 subs | 2 h 49 min2,535 subs |
| Bortle 6Bright suburban | 14 min210 subs | 56 min838 subs | 3 h 43 min3,349 subs |
| Bortle 7Suburban / urban transition | 20 min307 subs | 1 h 22 min1,225 subs | 5 h 27 min4,898 subs |
| Bortle 8City | 30 min457 subs | 2 h 02 min1,826 subs | 8 h 07 min7,304 subs |
| Bortle 9Inner city | 52 min778 subs | 3 h 27 min3,109 subs | 14 h12,436 subs |
Power and kit for this session
Allowing for slewing, focusing and rejected subs, that is about 1 h 13 min of run time. The eQuinox 2’s battery (rated about 11 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-C power bank 20000mAh 5V 2AUnistellar asks for a 5 V 2 A output; PD is not needed.
- 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 eQuinox 2 →
How it frames
The M87 is 8′ × 7′ across. The eQuinox 2 frames 0.76° × 0.57° at 1.33″ per pixel, so it fills 23% of the frame’s short side.
About the M87
The supergiant elliptical at the heart of the Virgo cluster, home of the first-photographed black hole. Bright, round, structureless.
NGC 4486, Virgo A · Galaxy in Virgo · magnitude 8.6 · 8′ × 7′ · best in Mar, Apr, May. 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 Unistellar eQuinox 2
A 114 mm Newtonian with five times the light grasp of a 50 mm refractor. Fixed 4 s subs put it in read-noise territory under dark skies, but the aperture carries it. The published field is 45.6′ × 34.2′, a crop of the sensor.
Fixed 4 s subs in Enhanced Vision; they cannot be changed. No built-in filter. Unistellar sells only a solar filter and says a third-party filter is at your own risk and voids the warranty.
The eQuinox 2 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 M87 from a eQuinox 2? Email it with your total time and sky to [email protected] and it goes here, credited.
Same target, other telescopes
- M87 with the ZWO Seestar S50: 1 h 03 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the ZWO Seestar S50 Pro: 1 h 08 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the ZWO Seestar S30: 1 h 06 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro: 1 h 13 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the DwarfLab DWARF 3: 1 h 31 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the DwarfLab DWARF mini: 1 h 02 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the DwarfLab Draco: 51 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the DwarfLab DWARF II: 3 h 32 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Vaonis Vespera II: 1 h 03 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro: 2 h 20 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Vaonis Vespera 3: 1 h from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2: 2 h 13 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Unistellar Odyssey: 4 h 16 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Celestron Origin: 17 min from Bortle 6
- M87 with the Celestron Origin Mark II: 23 min from Bortle 6