M83 also known as the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy or NGC 5236 is a barred spiral galaxy around half the size of our own Milky Way galaxy. It is 15 million light years from us give or take a little! When the light photons in this image left M83 the Earth was cooling considerably allowing sea invertebrates to evolve considerable numbers of new species, yet apes were still a very distant reality. M83 is at the center of the Centaurus A/M83 Group of galaxies’.
Captured from my back garden on a TS Photoline 80mm triplet with my Sony SLT-A99 camera, 50mm guidescope & webcam on an HEQ5-Pro EQ Mount. Software used, EQMOD, PHD2, Cartes Du Ciel. 3.5 hours of 5-minute exposures calibrated with dark and light frames were processed in Pixinsight.
Gary, you have gathered plenty of data here and your post processing seems adequate to produce pleasing results but you have some issues with your focusing. The detail that you should have is just not there. If you are finding it difficult to focus your telescope, I suggest you buy ( or make ) a Bahtinov Mask. Do a Google Search on them and you will find out all about how to use one. It is also important to remember to lock your focuser once you've achieved focus. Good luck.
