M64 has a very bright nucleus which easily highlights the
prominent dust lane (the obvious dark band). The disk of M64
outside of the nuclear regions, in contrast, is rather low
surface brightness and generally can't be seen with visual
observation or even on some photographs. The image presented
here corresponds approximately to that situation since most of
the disk is not visible. The overall angular size of M64 is 6 x
3 arcminutes. Only the inner 2 arcminutes have high surface
brightness.