How long to image the M99 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro
From a Bortle 6 suburban sky, the Vaonis Vespera Pro needs about 6 h 16 min (2,256 subs of 10 s) for a solid image of the M99. A quick look takes 1 h 34 min; a showpiece 25 h. Under a Bortle 3 rural sky the solid figure drops to 2 h 41 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 6% 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 | 35 min211 subs | 2 h 20 min843 subs | 9 h 22 min3,370 subs |
| Bortle 2Typical dark site | 37 min222 subs | 2 h 28 min886 subs | 9 h 51 min3,544 subs |
| Bortle 3Rural | 40 min242 subs | 2 h 41 min968 subs | 11 h3,872 subs |
| Bortle 4Rural / suburban transition | 49 min292 subs | 3 h 14 min1,167 subs | 13 h4,668 subs |
| Bortle 5Suburban | 1 h 02 min371 subs | 4 h 07 min1,482 subs | 16 h5,928 subs |
| Bortle 6Bright suburban | 1 h 34 min564 subs | 6 h 16 min2,256 subs | 25 h9,022 subs |
| Bortle 7Suburban / urban transition | 2 h 35 min933 subs | 10 h3,729 subs | 41 h14,916 subs |
| Bortle 8City | 4 h 11 min1,505 subs | 17 h6,017 subs | 67 h24,068 subs |
| Bortle 9Inner city | 7 h 34 min2,725 subs | 30 h10,897 subs | 120+ h43,586 subs |
Power and kit for this session
Allowing for slewing, focusing and rejected subs, that is about 8 h 09 min of run time. That is more than one night: over 2 nights, about 4 h 04 min each. The Vespera Pro’s battery (rated about 11 h) should cover each night; a power bank still keeps the phone running the app alive. (Bortle 6, solid image; we allow 30% over the integration time.)
- USB-C PD power bank 20000mAh 30WExtends the 11 h battery; 30 W PD per Vaonis.
- red LED head torchRed light keeps your night vision; white light costs you twenty minutes of dark adaptation every time.
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How it frames
The M99 is 5.4′ × 4.8′ across. The Vespera Pro frames 1.62° × 1.62° at 1.65″ per pixel, so it fills 6% 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 | 2 h 41 min968 subs | 4 h 07 min1,482 subs | 10 h3,729 subs |
| 20 s | 2 h 14 min403 subs | 3 h 40 min660 subs | 9 h 54 min1,784 subs |
| 30 s | 2 h 05 min251 subs | 3 h 31 min422 subs | 9 h 45 min1,171 subs |
About the M99
A face-on spiral with one arm flung out by an encounter. Small but distinctive.
NGC 4254, Coma Pinwheel · Galaxy in Coma Berenices · magnitude 9.9 · 5.4′ × 4.8′ · 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 Vaonis Vespera Pro
The square-sensor Vespera with 2 µm pixels. Higher resolution than the II, and correspondingly slower per pixel: expect around double the time for the same per-pixel SNR. Run-out in 2026 and replaced by the Vespera Pro 2.
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.
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 M99 from a Vespera Pro? Email it with your total time and sky to [email protected] and it goes here, credited.
Same target, other telescopes
- M99 with the ZWO Seestar S50: 2 h 48 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the ZWO Seestar S50 Pro: 3 h 04 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the ZWO Seestar S30: 2 h 56 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro: 3 h 15 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the DwarfLab DWARF 3: 4 h 04 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the DwarfLab DWARF mini: 2 h 47 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the DwarfLab Draco: 2 h 18 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the DwarfLab DWARF II: 9 h 34 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Vaonis Vespera II: 2 h 48 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Vaonis Vespera 3: 2 h 40 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2: 5 h 58 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Unistellar eQuinox 2: 2 h 32 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Unistellar Odyssey: 12 h from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Celestron Origin: 44 min from Bortle 6
- M99 with the Celestron Origin Mark II: 1 h 01 min from Bortle 6
All telescopes for the M99 · All targets for the Vespera Pro