View allAll Photos Tagged ConeNebula
Hydrogen-alpha emissions were rich in the area. Oblique straight fine dark filaments looked to be connecting two faint hydrogen-alpha emission areas near the center of the frame.
Equipment: Sigma 28mmF1.4 "Art," Dual Narrowband Filter IDAS NB12 or Clear Filter, and EOS R6-SP5, modified by Seo San on ZWO AM5 Equatorial Mount, autoguided with Fujinon 1:2.8/75mm C-Mount Lens, Pentax x2 Extender, ZWO ASI 120MM-mini, and PHD2 Guiding
Exposure: 6 times x 1,800 seconds, 3 x 240 sec, and 5 x 60 seconds at ISO 6,400 and f/3.5 with Dual Narrowband Filter and 3 times 240 seconds and 19 times 60 seconds at ISO 1,600 and f/3.5 with Clear Filter
site: 2,434m above sea level at lat. 24 39 52 south and long. 70 16 11 west near Cerro Armazones in Sierra Vicuña Mackenna in Coast Range of Chile
Ambient temperature was 11 degrees Celsius or 52 degrees Fahrenheit. Wind was mild, and guide error RMS was 0.73". Sky was dark, and SQML was 21.78 at the night.
NGC 2237, NGC 2238, NGC 2239, NGC 2244, NGC 2246 Nebulosa Roseta. Es una región HII grande y circular, ubicada en el borde de una gigantesca nube molecular en la constelación del Unicornio (Monoceros), situada en el ecuador galáctico. El cúmulo abierto NGC 2244 (Caldwell 50) está estrechamente asociado con la nebulosa, de tal manera que las estrellas del cúmulo se han formado de la materia de la misma. La nebulosa mide más de 1º de diámetro aparente (como casi tres lunas llenas) y se encuentra a unos 5.200 años luz.
Sh2-280. Nebulosa de emisión de unos 40’ situada a unos 5.500 años luz.
Sh2-282. Nebulosa de emisión de unos 30’ situada a unos 4.100 años luz.
NGC 2252. Es un cúmulo estelar abierto situado en la parte norte-oriental de la nebulosa Roseta. Fue descubierto por William Herschel en 1786. Se encuentra a unos 2.900 años luz.
LBN 952. Es una nebulosa de emisión de 30’ de tamaño aparente.
LBN 947. Es una nebulosa de emisión de 15’ de tamaño aparente.
Cúmulo de Árbol Navideño. Es un cúmulo estelar abierto en la constelación de Monoceros. Fue llamado así porque se parece a un árbol en luz visible y contiene cerca de 40 estrellas. En la base de la agrupación está su miembro más brillante, 15 Monocerotis (S Mon), una estrella gigante de tipo espectral O7, cerca de 8.500 veces más luminosa que el Sol, que varía entre las magnitudes 4,2 y 4,6. Forma parte de la nebulosa del Cono.
NGC 2264 Nebulosa del Cono. Es una región HII en la constelación de Monoceros. Fue descubierta por William Herschel en 1785. La nebulosa se encuentra a unos 2.700 años luz. La nebulosa se llama así por la forma cónica que proviene de una nebulosa de absorción oscura que consiste de hidrógeno frío molecular y polvo frente a una débil nebulosa de emisión que contiene hidrógeno ionizado por el sistema binario S Monocerotis.
NGC 2251. Es un cúmulo estelar abierto descubierto por William Herschel en 1783. Se encuentra a unos 4.300 años luz años.
IC 447. Es una nebulosa de reflexión situada en una zona con otras nebulosas más pequeñas de reflexión y oscuras. Está a unos 2.480 años luz.
NGC 2237, NGC 2238, NGC 2239, NGC 2244, NGC 2246 Rosette Nebula. It is a large and circular HII region, located on the edge of a gigantic molecular cloud in Unicorn constellation (Monoceros), located at the galactic equator. The open cluster NGC 2244 (Caldwell 50) is closely associated with the nebula, in such a way that the stars of the cluster have been formed fris this material. The nebula is more than 1 ° in apparent diameter (about three full moons) and is about 5,200 light years away.
Sh2-280. Nebula emission of about 40' about 5,500 light-years away.
Sh2-282. Emulating nebula about 30' about 4,100 light-years away.
NGC 2252. It is an open stellar cluster located in the north-eastern part of Rosette Nebula. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1786. It is about 2,900 light-years away.
LBN 952. It is an emission nebula of 30 'of apparent size.
LBN 947. It is an emission nebula of 15 'of apparent size.
Christmas Tree Cluster. It is an open star cluster in Monoceros constellation. It was named so because it looks like a tree in visible light and contains about 40 stars. At the base of the cluster is its brightest member, 15 Monocerotis (S Mon), a O7 giant star spectral type , about 8,500 times brighter than the Sun, varying between magnitudes 4,2 and 4,6. It is part of ConeNebula.
NGC 2264 Cone Nebula. It is an HII region in Monoceros Monoceros. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1785. The nebula is about 2,700 light years away. The nebula is thus called the conical form that comes from a dark absorption nebula consisting of molecular cold hydrogen and dust against a weak emission nebula containing hydrogen ionized by binary stellar system S Monocerotis.
NGC 2251. It is an open star cluster discovered by William Herschel in 1783. It is about 4,300 light-years away.
IC 447. It is a reflection nebula located in an area with other smaller nebulae of reflection and dark. It is about 2,480 light-years away.
A Christmas Tree in Space! Here is my test shot of it! Merry Christmas All!
NGC-2264 The Christmas Tree Star Cluster & Cone Nebula Region(top) captured on 10-26-2014 from my observatory at JBSPO in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
The brightest star is the base or central trunk of the Tree..and the other stars form the traditional Christmas Tree shape, hence the nickname "The Christmas Tree Cluster". It is located 800 Parsecs or 2,600 Light years away in the constellation of Monoceros "The Unicorn". Also visible in the image is the Fox Fur Nebula(Red) & Snowflake Cluster. The region has a lot of Molecular Hydrogen dust clouds and is a large Star formation region.
Canon 6D DSLR & my Home-built 16 inch diameter Newtonian telescope.
ISO 3200, 240 second exposure.
Best Regards,
John Chumack
equipment: Zeiss Distagon 40mm F4 CFE IF for Hasselblad at F4 and Canon EOS 5Dmk2-sp2 by Seo san at ISO 1,600 on Takahashi EM-200 temma 2Jr, autoguided with FSQ-106ED, hiro-design off-axis guider, StarlightXpress Lodestar autoguider, and PHD Guiding
exposure: 6 time x 30 minutes, 5 x 15 min, 5 x 8 min, 5 x 4 min, and 5 x 1 minute
Location: 11,000 feet above sea level near MLO, Mauna Loa Observatory on the shoulder of Mauna Loa in the Big Island, Hawaii
A 15 second exposure of the night sky made with my Canon IXUS compact camera. The brownish hue is caused by light pollution.
Orion's belt can be seen in the lower center part of the frame and the Pleiades in the upper right. Just below Orion's belt you can see a vertical line of three dots - The middle one is M42 (also known as the Great Orion Nebula).
Designated NGC 2264, this is in the Monoceros Constellation (Unicorn), 2600 light-years away. If you angle your head 45 degrees to the right, you can see where it gets its name. The Cone Nebula by the way is that pointy finger looking thing about 2 o'clock from centre a third of the way down the image. Not greatly detailed, but I wouldn't expect it to be for such a short exposure! :)
Taken at the same time (shortly before actually) as the Leo Triplet I uploaded yesterday, it was beset with the same problems. I took 80 60sec subs and, because the mount was being a pig (no disrespect to pigs), I could only use 36 of them - so this is 36 minutes. I've never pointed my kit at an area of sky with so much red stuff before (that's Hydrogen Alpha, Hα for short), so I'm kinda pleased with this. Horrendous coma, but that's a "feature" of the kit, and I can't afford a coma corrector, so I have to put up with it. :)
Might have another go at processing later - this was a bit of a rush job to see what I had. The darks problem I had last night is now fixed - DSS being temperamental!
24 March 2011
200p, EQ5 unguided
Nikon D70 full spectrum prime focus
36 x 60sec, iso 1600
darks, bias and flats.
Stacked in DSS processed in CS5
Resembling a nightmarish beast rearing its head from a crimson sea, this monstrous object is actually an innocuous pillar of gas and dust. Called the Cone Nebula (and cataloged NGC 2264) is so named because, in ground-based images, it has a conical shape. This giant pillar resides in a turbulent star-forming region. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope imaged the "Cone Nebula," a nebula close to home. It exhibits a craggy-looking mountaintop of cold gas and dust that is a cousin to Hubble's iconic "pillars of creation" in the Eagle Nebula, photographed in 1995.
The Christmas Tree Cluster (NGC2264) and Cone Nebula in #OSCNB from under a Borle 7 sky in Austin, Texas, 2023-12-05 with 2 hours total exposure (120 x 5').
WO RedCat 250/51mm, L-Ultimate dual NB filter, ASI533 MC camera, ASIAIR Plus controller, SW AZ-EQ5 mount.
Processed in PixInsight, drizzle stacked then SPCC, RC-Astro Noise/Blur/StarXTerminator plugins, GHS, Curves, and PS final exp and crop
Hubble's Variable nebula (NGC 2261) is top left - the shape and brightness slowly changes visibly over weeks and months, and the nebula looks like a small comet (Wikipedia).
Imaged on the 24th/25th of November 2023 from the Astronomical Society of Edinburgh's remote telescope facility in Trevinca, Spain.
Sharpstar 94 mm f/4.4 (with reducer) Triplet Apo Refractor
TS-Optics ToupTek Colour Astro Camera 2600CP
JTW mount
Optolong L filter
66 x 5 minute exposures (5 hours 30 minutes).
25 Flats, 25 Dark Flats and 25 Darks
Stacked by the ASERO Team
Processed with Siril (including Starnet Star Removal and Recomposition) and Gimp
A nice field of emission and reflection nebulas in Monocerous, with NGC 2264 the Christmas Tree Cluster area including the Cone Nebula on the lower edge of the main area of nebulosity. The yellowish star cluster below centre is Trumpler 5. Hubble's Variable Nebula is in the field (NGC 2261) but is very small at lower left of centre.
This is a stack of 5 x 12 and 2 x 10 minute exposures under sometimes hazy skies, with the Borg 77mm astrographic apo refractor at f/4.3 (330mm focal length) and filter-modified Canon 5D Mark II at ISO 800. Taken from Coonabarabran, NSW, Australia, March 2014.
equipment: S-orthoplanar 60mmF4 at F5.6 and EOS 5Dmk2-sp2 by Seo san at ISO 1,600 on EM-200 temma 2 Jr. autoguided with hiro-design off-axis guider, Starlight Xpress Lodestar Autoguider, and PHD guiding.
exposure: 4 times x 30 minutes, 4 x 4 min, 4 x 1 minute
location: 4,000 feet above sea level in Nikko, Japan
Edited European Southern Observatory/Digitized Sky Survey wide-field image of the Cone Nebula. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: This image from the Digitized Sky Survey (DSS) shows the region of the sky around the Cone Nebula. The nebulous area at the centre of the image is NGC 2264, an area of the sky that includes the Christmas Tree star cluster and the Cone Nebula below it (at the very centre of the frame).
Cone Nebula on December 18 with 4 hours of integration.
Taken on a very cold night for the bay area with temps down to 30F. It was cold enough that the peltier cooler didn't want to run. Thus, surprisingly, the camera ran a bit hotter than normal - temps ranged from 11-14C.
I'm not sure where the diffraction line is coming from - there may be some debris on the telescope lenses. Either that or I have pinched the optics with all the ring clamps I've applied to combat flexure. When the weather clears after the holidays I'll try again.
25 total subs of 600 seconds at 400 ISO.
Stellarvue SV4 scope
Modified Pentax K10D camera with cooler
IDAS LPR filter
SSF6 flattener
Guided by SSAG on SV70ED with Maxim
Calibrated with Maxim with 76 darks, 64 flats, 256 bias.
Stacked with DSS 3.3.3 beta 47
Processed with PI: crop, DBE, masked stretch, Histogram stretch, Masked Atrous NR on Luminince, Chrominance, and a bias boost on RGB, Deconvolution, and curves to drive the highlights brighter and the lowlights deeper.
Here's the platesolve results:
Referentiation Matrix (Gnomonic projection = Matrix * Coords[x,y]):
+0.000057625012 -0.000527667003 +0.575417672017
+0.000527668111 +0.000057831811 -1.097413662155
+0.000000000000 +0.000000000000 +1.000000000000
Resolution ........ 1.911 arcsec/pix
Rotation .......... 96.242 deg
Focal ............. 655.19 mm
Pixel size ........ 6.07 um
Field of view ..... 2d 3' 23.0" x 1d 22' 56.1"
Image center ...... RA: 06 40 58.363 Dec: +09 59 17.47
Image bounds:
top-left ....... RA: 06 43 18.109 Dec: +08 53 25.72
top-right ...... RA: 06 44 13.542 Dec: +10 56 01.75
bottom-left .... RA: 06 37 44.317 Dec: +09 02 26.12
bottom-right ... RA: 06 38 37.672 Dec: +11 05 05.55
Located approximately 2600 Light years from earth in the constellation of Monoceros we have NGC 2264 commonly refered to as the Christmas Tree Cluster and part of NGC 2264 is the Cone Nebula
The Cone Nebula is classed as a Dark Absorbtion Nebula due to the Cold Hydrogen located within the nebula
Image Details
11x 10 Min ISO 800
43 x Dark Frames
55x Flat Frames
Celestron C80ED Apo Refractor
Canon 450D Modified
Skywatcher 80 Guide Scope
Orion Starshoot Autoguider
Images aquired with BackyardEOS
Images Stacked with Nebulosity 2.3.0
Post Processed with Photoshop CS5
I plan on getting more exposures on this subject soon
Following on from my picture of NGC891 I thought I would see what I can get with this object with an unmodded DSLR. well not that great! I think it's about the best I'm going to get but I might at sometime take some 5min shots using a UHC filter, convert to BW and add them in as "Luminance"
EQUIPMENT:
Telescope Meade 6000 115mm and HEQ5.
Canon EOS 1100D (unmodded).
Orion Mini Auto Guide.
CONDITIONS:
Hum 90%
Temp -3 degC
PHOTO DETAILS:
NGC2264 Cone Nebula (Cristmas Tree Cluster)
ISO1600.
51 120 Sec Subs (Lights).
25 Darks.
10 Flats.
PROCESSING SOFTWARE:
DSS
PS CS2
After months of not being able to do anything, the cloud gods finally took pity...and got clear skies :)
Sort of...
Setup used : www.flickr.com/photos/stormlv/8388012341/in/photostream/
---Photo details----
Stacks : 40x3min
Exposure Time : 2h
Stack program : Maxim DL v5
Stack mode : Sigma clip
Post processing : MaximDL v5 and Photoshop CS5
---Photo scope---
Camera : Atik 460EX
CCD Temperature : -20 Celsius
Filter used:
- Astrodon 5nm Hα 36mm unmounted
Tube : Skywatcher StarTravel-102
Type : Refractor
Focal length : 500 mm
Aperture : F/4.9
---Guide scope---
Camera : Starlight Xpress Lodestar
Guide exposure : 0.5 sec
Starlight Xpress Off Axis Guider
---Mount and other stuff---
Mount : Skywatcher NEQ-6
Filter wheel : Starlight Xpress
---Image details---
Objects
----------
--
Source : dso-browser.com/
Taken with a 460ex and 7nm Baader Ha filter through a Skywatcher ED80 on an NEQ6. This is 15 600sec exposures. Seeing was very poor and taken from heavy light pollution.
This very faint nebula is located in the constellation of Monoceros. It is 2700 light years from Earth.
The International Space Station glides overhead from CA Hot Springs, CA. Exposure was 2 minutes 41 seconds. The ISS came up low in the northwest and went across from right to left in this photo.
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Christmas Tree cluster and the Cone Nebula. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: This colour image of the region known as NGC 2264 — an area of sky that includes the sparkling blue baubles of the Christmas Tree star cluster and the Cone Nebula — was created from data taken through four different filters (B, V, R and H-alpha) with the Wide Field Imager at ESO's La Silla Observatory, 2400 m high in the Atacama Desert of Chile in the foothills of the Andes. The image shows a region of space about 30 light-years across. This image is available as a mounted image in the ESOshop.
2 small mosaic passes (1.6º x 1.6º) processed with PixInsight.
At bottom right is Hubble's Variable Nebula (NGC 2261)
8 x 4-minute exposures at ISO 1600, f/4. Pentacon 300mm lens & unmodified EOS 40D, piggybacked on a Celestron C8 telescope for manual guiding. Frames registered and stacked using DeepSkyStacker.
Need a lot more sub-exposures, but clear nights are hard to come by! As it was, this night was much interrupted by cloud and rain showers, so I managed only just over 30 mins worth of frames.
Resembling a nightmarish beast rearing its head from a crimson sea, this celestial object is actually just a pillar of gas and dust. Called the Cone Nebula (in NGC 2264) - so named because in ground-based images it has a conical shape - this monstrous pillar resides in a turbulent star-forming region. This picture, taken by the newly installed Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, shows the upper 2.5 light-years of the Cone, a height that equals 23 million roundtrips to the Moon. The entire pillar is seven light-years long. Radiation from hot, young stars (located beyond the top of the image) has slowly eroded the nebula over millions of years. Ultraviolet light heats the edges of the dark cloud, releasing gas into the relatively empty region of surrounding space. There, additional ultraviolet radiation causes the hydrogen gas to glow, which produces the red halo of light seen around the pillar. A similar process occurs on a much smaller scale to gas surrounding a single star, forming the bow-shaped arc seen near the upper left side of the Cone. This arc, seen previously with the Hubble telescope, is 65 times larger than the diameter of our Solar System. The blue-white light from surrounding stars is reflected by dust. Background stars can be seen peeking through the evaporating tendrils of gas, while the turbulent base is pockmarked with stars reddened by dust. Over time, only the densest regions of the Cone will be left. But inside these regions, stars and planets may form. The Cone Nebula resides 2500 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros. The Cone is a cousin of the M16 pillars, which the Hubble telescope imaged in 1995. Consisting mainly of cold gas, the pillars in both regions resist being eroded away by the blistering ultraviolet radiation from young, massive stars. Pillars like the Cone and M16 are common in large regions of star birth. Astronomers believe that these pillars may be incubators for developing stars. The ACS made this observation on 2 April 2002. The colour image is constructed from three separate images taken in blue, near-infrared, and hydrogen-alpha filters. Image credit: NASA, the ACS Science Team (H. Ford, G. Illingworth, M. Clampin, G. Hartig, T. Allen, K. Anderson, F. Bartko, N. Benitez, J. Blakeslee, R. Bouwens, T. Broadhurst, R. Brown, C. Burrows, D. Campbell, E. Cheng, N. Cross, P. Feldman, M. Franx, D. Golimowski, C. Gronwall, R. Kimble, J. Krist, M. Lesser, D. Magee, A. Martel, W. J. McCann, G. Meurer, G. Miley, M. Postman, P. Rosati, M. Sirianni, W. Sparks, P. Sullivan, H. Tran, Z. Tsvetanov, R. White, and R. Woodruff) and ESA
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Cone Nebula, released as part of the organization's 60th anniversary.
Original caption: The Cone Nebula is part of a star-forming region of space, NGC 2264, about 2500 light-years away. Its pillar-like appearance is a perfect example of the shapes that can develop in giant clouds of cold molecular gas and dust, known for creating new stars. This dramatic new view of the nebula was captured with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), and released on the occasion of ESO’s 60th anniversary.
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Cone Nebula, released as part of the organization's 60th anniversary. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: The Cone Nebula is part of a star-forming region of space, NGC 2264, about 2500 light-years away. Its pillar-like appearance is a perfect example of the shapes that can develop in giant clouds of cold molecular gas and dust, known for creating new stars. This dramatic new view of the nebula was captured with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), and released on the occasion of ESO’s 60th anniversary.
NGC 2264 Cone Nebula (WIP)
Adding only 2 hours of data which theoretically would cause a 1.29 times increase in the S/N. It actually added a bit more as I could change from a medium combine to an SDMask combine which gives a bit better performance. Flipping between this and previous gives a good feel for how important a change in 29% in S/N. Comming along slowly, way to many cloudy night.
Equipment:
Mount-Paramount ME
Image Train:- SBIG STL 6303 -> Astrodon MOAG -> FLI PDF Focuser -> OTA
OTA: - Takahishi 67 flattener - > Atro Tech 10" RCF F8.0
Filtration: Heutech LPS, Astrodon 3nm NB
Plate solve:
RA 06h 41m 21s, Dec +09° 22' 20"
Pos Angle +175° 02', FL 2048.3 mm, 0.91"/Pixel
Exposure: Heutech LPS prefilter, Astrodon NB Feb 09 2012
5 X 60 minutes bin 1 Ha(3nm) red ( 300 minutes)
Total time on target: ( 300 minutes) 5.00 hours
Imaging and guiding thru Maxim DL, Guided thru MOAG 0.2 hrz
Process: Calibration/Assembly Maxim DL, post processing PixInsite/Photohop
Cone and Fox-fur nebula in Halpha. Perhaps over-processed (a little ringing on the bright stars) and stretched a bit too much (a bit more noise that I'd like), but I wanted to see the faint stuff. This definitely needs more exposure time and subexposure time, but the clouds were frequently interrupting longer subexposures. Decided many shorter exposures were the way to go, letting me weed out the bad frames.
Imaging scope: Astro-Tech 106mm Triplet
Imaging Camera: ST8300M (capture with Equinox Image)
Filters: Baader filters in FW5-8300 filter wheel
Guide scope: Orion EON 80mm
Guide camera: Starfish Fishcamp (guided with PHD)
Mount: Atlas EQ-G
Calibrated in Equinox Image and processed in PixInsight.
Halpha: 10x8min (2x2)
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Cone Nebula, released as part of the organization's 60th anniversary. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: The Cone Nebula is part of a star-forming region of space, NGC 2264, about 2500 light-years away. Its pillar-like appearance is a perfect example of the shapes that can develop in giant clouds of cold molecular gas and dust, known for creating new stars. This dramatic new view of the nebula was captured with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), and released on the occasion of ESO’s 60th anniversary.
Edited European Southern Observatory image of the Cone Nebula, released as part of the organization's 60th anniversary. Grayscale variant.
Original caption: The Cone Nebula is part of a star-forming region of space, NGC 2264, about 2500 light-years away. Its pillar-like appearance is a perfect example of the shapes that can develop in giant clouds of cold molecular gas and dust, known for creating new stars. This dramatic new view of the nebula was captured with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), and released on the occasion of ESO’s 60th anniversary.
Resembling a nightmarish beast rearing its head from a crimson sea, this celestial object is actually just a pillar of gas and dust. Called the Cone Nebula (in NGC 2264) - so named because in ground-based images it has a conical shape - this monstrous pillar resides in a turbulent star-forming region. This picture, taken by the newly installed Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, shows the upper 2.5 light-years of the Cone, a height that equals 23 million roundtrips to the Moon. The entire pillar is seven light-years long. Radiation from hot, young stars (located beyond the top of the image) has slowly eroded the nebula over millions of years. Ultraviolet light heats the edges of the dark cloud, releasing gas into the relatively empty region of surrounding space. There, additional ultraviolet radiation causes the hydrogen gas to glow, which produces the red halo of light seen around the pillar. A similar process occurs on a much smaller scale to gas surrounding a single star, forming the bow-shaped arc seen near the upper left side of the Cone. This arc, seen previously with the Hubble telescope, is 65 times larger than the diameter of our Solar System. The blue-white light from surrounding stars is reflected by dust. Background stars can be seen peeking through the evaporating tendrils of gas, while the turbulent base is pockmarked with stars reddened by dust. Over time, only the densest regions of the Cone will be left. But inside these regions, stars and planets may form. The Cone Nebula resides 2500 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros. The Cone is a cousin of the M16 pillars, which the Hubble telescope imaged in 1995. Consisting mainly of cold gas, the pillars in both regions resist being eroded away by the blistering ultraviolet radiation from young, massive stars. Pillars like the Cone and M16 are common in large regions of star birth. Astronomers believe that these pillars may be incubators for developing stars. The ACS made this observation on 2 April 2002. The colour image is constructed from three separate images taken in blue, near-infrared, and hydrogen-alpha filters. Image credit: NASA, the ACS Science Team (H. Ford, G. Illingworth, M. Clampin, G. Hartig, T. Allen, K. Anderson, F. Bartko, N. Benitez, J. Blakeslee, R. Bouwens, T. Broadhurst, R. Brown, C. Burrows, D. Campbell, E. Cheng, N. Cross, P. Feldman, M. Franx, D. Golimowski, C. Gronwall, R. Kimble, J. Krist, M. Lesser, D. Magee, A. Martel, W. J. McCann, G. Meurer, G. Miley, M. Postman, P. Rosati, M. Sirianni, W. Sparks, P. Sullivan, H. Tran, Z. Tsvetanov, R. White, and R. Woodruff) and ESA
Cone Nebula on December 18 with 4 hours of integration.
Taken on a very cold night for the bay area with temps down to 30F. It was cold enough that the peltier cooler didn't want to run. Thus, surprisingly, the camera ran a bit hotter than normal - temps ranged from 11-14C.
I'm not sure where the diffraction line is coming from - there may be some debris on the telescope lenses. Either that or I have pinched the optics with all the ring clamps I've applied to combat flexure. When the weather clears after the holidays I'll try again.
25 total subs of 600 seconds at 400 ISO.
Stellarvue SV4 scope
Modified Pentax K10D camera with cooler
IDAS LPR filter
SSF6 flattener
Guided by SSAG on SV70ED with Maxim
Calibrated with Maxim with 76 darks, 64 flats, 256 bias.
Stacked with DSS 3.3.3 beta 47
Processed with PI: crop, DBE, masked stretch, Histogram stretch, Masked Atrous NR on Luminince, Chrominance, and a bias boost on RGB, Deconvolution, and curves to drive the highlights brighter and the lowlights deeper.
Here's the platesolve results:
Referentiation Matrix (Gnomonic projection = Matrix * Coords[x,y]):
+0.000057625012 -0.000527667003 +0.575417672017
+0.000527668111 +0.000057831811 -1.097413662155
+0.000000000000 +0.000000000000 +1.000000000000
Resolution ........ 1.911 arcsec/pix
Rotation .......... 96.242 deg
Focal ............. 655.19 mm
Pixel size ........ 6.07 um
Field of view ..... 2d 3' 23.0" x 1d 22' 56.1"
Image center ...... RA: 06 40 58.363 Dec: +09 59 17.47
Image bounds:
top-left ....... RA: 06 43 18.109 Dec: +08 53 25.72
top-right ...... RA: 06 44 13.542 Dec: +10 56 01.75
bottom-left .... RA: 06 37 44.317 Dec: +09 02 26.12
bottom-right ... RA: 06 38 37.672 Dec: +11 05 05.55
As viewed from New Zealand, the constellation of Orion as it moves across the northern sky. This composite image was created by combining a series of unguided exposures with a final tracked exposure.
Canon EOS5DMkII 254mm Newtonian @ 1200mm 46 x 30s f/4.8 ISO6400 2011-01-06 20:51:29-21:18:13 UT
Taken from Rookhope, Co. Durham (Bortle 3).
Unmodified DSLR, no filters, driven on HEQ5 mount but not guided.
NGC2264 lies in the constellation of Monoceros (the Unicorn) to the east of Orion, just south of Gemini. It comprises a star cluster supposed to be in the shape of a Christmas tree and various emission nebulae including the Cone Nebula at the top. The photo is inverted (south at the top) to make it easier to see the tree shape. The brightest star, at the base of the tree, is 4th magnitude star 15 Mon.
This is a single 38 min exp@ ISO 800. I was trying for 20 x 3min subs, but ran into a glitch. Also in the bottom left corner is the Hubble Variable Nebula.
Subject: NGC2064 -- Cone Nebula, Fox Fur Nebula, and Christmas Tree Cluster
Image FOV = 3 degrees 20 min (200 min) by 2 degrees 15 min (135 min)
Image Scale = 8 arc-second/pixel
Date: 2007/10/21
Location: near Halcottsville, NY
Exposure: 13 x 10 minutes = 2h10m total exposure, ISO800, f/4.8
Filter: Baader 7nm H-alpha filter
Camera: Hutech-modified Canon 30D
Telescope: SV80S 80mm f/6 + TV TRF-2008 0.8X reducer/flattener = 384mm FL, f/4.8
Mount: Astro-Physics AP900
Guiding: ST-402 autoguider and SV66 guidescope. MaximDL autoguiding software using 6-second guide exposures
Processing: Raw conversion and calibration with ImagesPlus (dark frames only, no bias or flat frames); Aligning and combing with Registar; Gray conversion, levels, curves, cropping/resizing, JPEG conversion with Photoshop CS. No sharpening or noise reduction.
Remarks: Temperature at end: 44F, SQM reading 21.4
The Cone Nebula, HSO composite mapped RGB, part of NGC 2264, the Christmas Tree Cluster, in the constellation of Monoceros (The Unicorn, just to the left of Orion and up a bit). Monochrome H, S, and O filters mapped onto red, green and blue colour channels. January 2023.
The Cone Nebula is an H II region, a pillar of gas and dust some 2,700 light-years distant.
Wikipedia: It is a dark absorption nebula consisting of cold molecular hydrogen and dust in front of a faint emission nebula containing hydrogen ionized by S Monocerotis, the brightest star of NGC 2264. The faint nebula is approximately seven light-years long (with an apparent length of 10 arcminutes), and is 2,700 light-years away.
The Milky Way runs through Monoceros (and Orion) so the sky here is full of spectacular gas clouds and star clusters.
Details:
Cone Nebula NGC 2264 in Monoceros - HSO/SHO composite
Distance 2,700 lyrs
Size 7 lyrs
Photograph taken in Astronomik Ha, SII and OIII narrow band emission line filters. Total exposure time 17.2 hrs.
Ha 2x2 bin - 32x600s = 5.3hrs, 17/18 and 21/22 January 2023
SII 2x2 bin - 37x600s = 6.2 hrs, 18/19 and 22/23 January 2023
OIII 2x2 bin - 34x600s = 5.7 hrs, 19/20 and 20/21 January 2023
Rig:
Imaging scope: SW Startravel 150mm F5 Refractor, 2.5x Celestron Luminos 2inch imaging barlow, Atik 460EX mono
Guide scope: SW Evostar 90mm F10, with guiding XY stage, ZWO 120MM camera
Guiding: 2 stage PHD: high frequency guide scope (mount tracking) and low frequency OAG image train guiding (guidescope flex)
Mount: Home made German Equatorial pillow block mount, permanently rooftop mounted. Spring loaded DEC axis gearing.
Other gadgets: ST4 based anti vibration shutter, ST4 based PEC
Processing:
PixInsight: Lights, Darks, Flats, Biases, Align Calibration, Linear fit, Channel Combination. StarNet2 star removal/star layer
BlurXterminator
GradXpert: Gradient removal
Topaz DeNoise AI: Noise removal
Affinity Photo: 32 bit image processing (curves, high pass masking, selective colour)
At the invitation of a fellow imaging buddy (good idea BM!) I went down to Saint Croix Observatory to collect some photons. I collected 3 hours of data on the Cone Nebula, then processed it at home over a few nights.
Much to my surprise I got something weird at the bottom of each frame. I thought it looked familiar, and figured it might have been a reflection inside the tube, but after looking it up in Sky Safari it turned out to be Hubble's Variable Nebula (of course!). After applying distortion correction I lost half of it, but surprises like this are always fun. Off to the right is the open cluster NGC 2259 (10th mag), another surprise.
The star of the show, the Cone Nebula, is at centre. The familiar cone shape is to the left of the main emission nebula. The cone itself is actually a dark absorption nebula, and looking around the image you can see a number of other dark nebulae as well.
The Cone Nebula, SHO recomposited mapped RGB, part of NGC 2264, the Christmas Tree Cluster, in the constellation of Monoceros (The Unicorn, just to the left of Orion and up a bit). Monochrome S, H, and O filters mapped onto red, green and blue colour channels. January 2023.
The Cone Nebula is an H II region, a pillar of gas and dust some 2,700 light-years distant.
Wikipedia: It is a dark absorption nebula consisting of cold molecular hydrogen and dust in front of a faint emission nebula containing hydrogen ionized by S Monocerotis, the brightest star of NGC 2264. The faint nebula is approximately seven light-years long (with an apparent length of 10 arcminutes), and is 2,700 light-years away.
The Milky Way runs through Monoceros (and Orion) so the sky here is full of spectacular gas clouds and star clusters.
Details:
Cone Nebula NGC 2264 in Monoceros - HSO/SHO composite
Distance 2,700 lyrs
Size 7 lyrs
Photograph taken in Astronomik Ha, SII and OIII narrow band emission line filters. Total exposure time 17.2 hrs.
Ha 2x2 bin - 32x600s = 5.3hrs, 17/18 and 21/22 January 2023
SII 2x2 bin - 37x600s = 6.2 hrs, 18/19 and 22/23 January 2023
OIII 2x2 bin - 34x600s = 5.7 hrs, 19/20 and 20/21 January 2023
Rig:
Imaging scope: SW Startravel 150mm F5 Refractor, 2.5x Celestron Luminos 2inch imaging barlow, Atik 460EX mono
Guide scope: SW Evostar 90mm F10, with guiding XY stage, ZWO 120MM camera
Guiding: 2 stage PHD: high frequency guide scope (mount tracking) and low frequency OAG image train guiding (guidescope flex)
Mount: Home made German Equatorial pillow block mount, permanently rooftop mounted. Spring loaded DEC axis gearing.
Other gadgets: ST4 based anti vibration shutter, ST4 based PEC
Processing:
PixInsight: Lights, Darks, Flats, Biases, Align Calibration, Linear fit, Channel Combination. StarNet2 star removal/star layer
BlurXterminator
GradXpert: Gradient removal
Topaz DeNoise AI: Noise removal
Affinity Photo: 32 bit image processing (curves, high pass masking, selective colour)