So you know these are summer targets at best viewing. It is May 2018 since I started in late April for Messier 63, my earlier attempts at one-night imaging never panned out for me due to short times and no clear skies. Here I tried 88 RGB frames but was only able to use 28 green, 3 lums, and 55 red. No clear skies over the past two months, the moon was just everywhere over the Sunflower Galaxy.   Here' s some facts about Messier 63.

Messier 63 (M63), also known as the Sunflower Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy located in the northern constellation Canes Venatici.
The Sunflower Galaxy lies roughly 37 million light years from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 9.3. Its designation in the New General Catalogue is NGC 5055.

Messier 63 is quite easy to find even though it lies in a relatively faint constellation. It is located about two-thirds of the way from Alkaid, the bright star that marks the end of the Big Dipper‘s handle, to Cor Caroli, the brightest star in Canes Venatici.

Next project I am working on is NGC 6946 is a face-on intermediate spiral galaxy with a small bright nucleus, whose location in the sky straddles the boundary between the northern constellations of Cepheus and Cygnus.
Distance to Earth: 22.5 million light years.

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