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Edited Hubble Space Telescope image of the spiral galaxy (seen edge-on) NGC 3432 with lots of red nebulae along the edge. Inverted grayscale variant.
Original caption: Believe it or not, this long, luminous streak, speckled with bright blisters and pockets of material, is a spiral galaxy like our Milky Way. But how could that be? It turns out that we see this galaxy, named NGC 3432, orientated directly edge-on to us from our vantage point here on Earth. The galaxy’s spiral arms and bright core are hidden, and we instead see the thin strip of its very outer reaches. Dark bands of cosmic dust, patches of varying brightness, and pink regions of star formation help with making out the true shape of NGC 3432 — but it’s still somewhat of a challenge! Because observatories such as the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have seen spiral galaxies at every kind of orientation, astronomers can tell when we happen to have caught one from the side. The galaxy is located in the constellation of Leo Minor (The Lesser Lion). Other telescopes that have had NGC 3432 in their sights include those of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), and the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS).
Optics: Takahashi FSQ106ED + f / 8 - 850mm
Frame: Losmandy G11- Gemini v.4
Camera: QSI683 ws8
Guided: Lunatic EZG-60 + QHY5
Filters: Baader HA 7nm + SII8nm + OIII 8.5nm
Focus: Lunatic autofocus - SELETEK
Place/Date: Pto. Sta. Mª (Cádiz), Spain - 03 August 2019
Acquisition: MaxIm DL + PHP Guiding + FocusMax
Processed: PixInsight Core + Photoshop CC
Halfa 15 x 720" + 30 Darks + 60 biats + 30 flats bininx1
SII 6 x 600" + 30 Darks + 60 biats + 30 flats bininx2
OIII 6 x 600" + 30 Darks + 60 biats + 30 flats bininx2
Author : Jesús Manuel Vargas
Looking at this cosmic cloud, cataloged as NGC 281, it is easy to overlook the stars of the open cluster IC 1590 it contains. But these young and massive stars, formed within the nebula, ultimately drive the omnipresent glow of the nebula. The striking forms that dominate this photograph of NGC 281 are sculpted columns and dense globules of dust that are seen in silhouette eroded by the intense and energetic winds and the radiation coming from the hot stars of the cluster. If they survive long enough, these dusty structures could also be places of future star formation. Called Pacman Nebula because of its global appearance, NGC 281 is about 10,000 light years away in the constellation Cassiopeia.
NGC 281 is a nebula of the constellation Cassiopeia.
It was discovered in August 1883 by astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard.
Distance to Earth: 9,459 light years
Radio: 48 light years
Magnitude: 7.4
Apparent dimensions (V): 35 ′
Constellation: Cassiopeia
Distance: 9500 ly (2900 pc)
The brightest nebulae in the sky, this diffuse emission nebula sits in Orion's sword.
It is about 1400 light years away. It is a 24 light year wide field where stars are forming.
Skywatcher Equinox 120APO
Canon 7D
iOptron iEQ45-GTN
5x2 minute frames
(lower left of centre)
Imaged from the Astronomical Society of Edinburgh's remote telescope facility in Trevinca, Spain.
Equipment:
Sharpstar 94 mm f/4.4 (with reducer) Triplet Apo Refractor
TS-Optics ToupTek Colour Astro Camera 2600CP
JTW mount
Optolong L Enhance
38 x 5 minute exposures (3 hours 10 minutes).
imaged on the morning of the 24th of November 2023
25 Flats, 25 Dark Flats and 25 Darks
Processed with Pixinsight, Photoshop and Topaz De-noise
The Iris Nebula, also NGC 7023 and Caldwell 4, is a bright reflection nebula and Caldwell object in the constellation Cepheus. Reflection nebulae are clouds of interstellar dust which reflect the light of a nearby star or stars. The energy from the nearby stars is insufficient to ionize the gas of the nebula to create an emission nebula, but is enough to give sufficient scattering to make the dust visible. NGC 7023 is actually the cluster within the nebula, LBN 487, and the nebula is lit by a magnitude +7 star, SAO 19158. It shines at magnitude +6.8. It is located near the Mira-type variable star T Cephei, and near the bright magnitude +3.23 variable star Beta Cephei (Alphirk). It lies 1,300 light-years away and is six light-years across.
This image is a quick processing to what, if anything, would come out...and enough did come out to make it worth removing some more of the lower quality frames and adding some better ones.
66 x 30 second exposures at 6400 ISO
10 x dark frames
8 x flat frames
24 x bias/offset frames (applied to flat frames only
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Taking a bit of a break from Cygnus for a moment, this image is from a region in neighboring Cepheus. This is another bi-color narrowband image with ionized hydrogen assigned to red, and ionized oxygen assigned to both green and blue (called the HOO palette). The red nebula is called the Flying Bat Nebula, and has been known about for a long time. The blue Squid Nebula however was only discovered in 2011 because it's extremely faint. I used this image as more of a test to see if I could bring it out. To put it in perspective, of the 28 hours and 41 minutes that went into this image, 21 hours and 9 minutes of that was through the Oxygen III filter.
These two reflection nebulae are rarely imaged and this image may well be a premiere for amateur astroimaging. vdB 149 is the blue reflection nebula on the center right,vdB150 the center left. The darker nebula just “above” vdB150 is Lynds Dark Nebula 1235. It is likely an Extended Red Emission nebula (ERE). These ERE are galactic dark nebulae at high latitudes that become visible through illumination by the interstellar radiation field.
Luminance data taken on Grammos Mt. Greece. RGB Color data taken on Parnon Mt.
Telescope: O.S RH200
Mount: AP Mach1 GTO
Camera: ATIK383L+ M
Filters: Baader LRGB
Total Exposure: 6h
Nebulae were becoming the new battlefields of 3171, as the Founder Guild discovered the potential for future star systems by celestially-controlling the environment of new stars, and speeding up the process by infusing huge amounts of hydrogen at high speeds. However, the Nul-konic organized crime association wanted the nebulae for their own shadowy purposes, and developed the coded fighter to fend off the attacks the guild were launching.
For the starfighters group build challenge.
[EN] I have been imaging a lot of nebulae these last couple of months but as the weather forecast of last night was rather pessimistic, I went for an object only requiring short exposure times i.e. Caldwell 14, also known as the Double Cluster (NGC 869 & NGC 884) in the constellation Perseus. It is so bright that I had to wear sunglasses during post-processing 😎. I will probably make a multi panel mosaic in a later stage but I already wanted to share this beauty with you. Enjoy
[NL] Door de pessimistische weersvoorspelling van vorig nacht leek het me een goed idee om voor een object te gaan dat minder belichtingstijd nodig heeft. Het werd Caldwell 14, ook wel bekend als de Double Cluster (NGC 869 & NGC 884) in het sterrenbeeld Perseus. Het beeld was zo verblindend dat ik tijdens de nabewerking een zonnebril moest dragen 😎. Waarschijnlijk zal ik in een later fase nog een multi-panel mozaïek maken, maar ik wou alvast deze schoonheid met jullie delen. Geniet ervan
Astrobin link: astrob.in/vzskt6/0/
📷 ZWO ASI533MC PRO - Optolong L-Pro
🌌 L-Pro: 41 lights - 180 sec (2h)- gain 101 - offset 40 -10°c
🔭 TS-PHoton 6" F5 (150/750) Newton with TS-Optics Newton Coma Corrector 1.0x
💫 guiding with ZWO ASI120 MC-S on TS-Optics 50mm
💻 PHD2, N.I.N.A, PixInsight, Topaz Denoise AI
📍🇧🇪 Belgium, Class 6 Bortle
Finally a rare break in the night sky... immediately took out the set and managed a quick Orion in H-alpha finished in monochrome. Clouds rolled in by 2am, so only did 17 subs.
Orion and Flame Nebulae
EM200, AP92, ASI094 with H-alpha
Singapore Dec 2020
an HDR image of total 40 minutes (2 x 10min + 2 x 5min + 2 x 150sec + 2 x 75sec + 2 x 38sec + 2 x 18sec + 2 x 9sec + 3 x 4sec + 2 x 2sec + 2 x 1sec) exposure of Lagoon and Trifid nebulae in Sagittarius with IDAS-modified Canon EOS 5D-AP and Takahashi FSQ-106ED with reducer QE 0.73x on EM-200 temma 2 Jr. mount, PHD autoguided with TIS DMK21AF04 and custom designed off-axis guider at 11,000 feet above sea level on Mauna Loa, Hawaii 2007-08-10.
I was taking pictures of the Aurora Borealis from a BA flight over Labrador and shot this at 38,000 feet through the huge window of an Airbus A380 on a tripod! It doesn't look like a typical solar flare. It was exactly in the direction of the Rosette Nebulae. Could this be really it?
The Cygnus cross with North American and Pelican Nebulae (NGC 7000) on the upper right, and the Gamma Cygni (Sadr) complex in the centre of the constellation.
Unmodded Nikon D7000, Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 G @ f/2, (7 mins) 9x40 sec, 1x60 sec @ ISO 400.
Sky Watcher Star Adventurer.
DSS and Photoshop.
IFN nebulae are mainly composed of cosmic dust illuminated by all the stars in our galaxy, and most of them are located at high galactic latitudes.
IFN is not illuminated by nearby stars, but by the integrated flux of every star in our galaxy. This means that IFN clouds are very faint and do not have brighter regions, which makes them very difficult to image.
Despite the inclusion of "nebula" in its name, IFN is not considered a nebulous object, because there is no star formation activity occurring in it, and it is only interstellar dust.
IFN is mainly composed of dust particles, carbon monoxide, hydrogen, and very small traces of other elements.
In the photo we can also see, among others, the faint planetary nebula Sh2-174 also called the Valentine's Rose, the open cluster NGC 188 or the spiral galaxy NGC 3172.
North American and Pelican Nebulae (NGC 7000) on upper right. Sadr complex in the centre of the image.
Unmodded Nikon D7000.
Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 G @ f/2, 7 mins (9x40 sec), 1x60 sec @ ISO 400. Darks: 5 Bias: 5
Sky Watcher Star Adventurer.
DSS, PixInsight LE and Photoshop
Photo by Janmejoy Sarker
The Cat's Eye Nebula (NGC 6543) is one of the best known planetary nebulae in the sky. Its more familiar outlines are seen in the brighter central region of the nebula in this impressive wide-angle view. But the composite image combines many short and long exposures to also reveal an extremely faint outer halo. At an estimated distance of 3,000 light-years, the faint outer halo is over 5 light-years across. Planetary nebulae have long been appreciated as a final phase in the life of a sun-like star. More recently, some planetary nebulae are found to have halos like this one, likely formed of material shrugged off during earlier episodes in the star's evolution. While the planetary nebula phase is thought to last for around 10,000 years, astronomers estimate the age of the outer filamentary portions of this halo to be 50,000 to 90,000 years. Visible on the left, some 50 million light-years beyond the watchful planetary nebula, lies spiral galaxy NGC 6552. via NASA
... toil and trouble...
The Double Star Cluster (in Perseus) and the double emission nebulae "Heart and Soul" (in Cassiopeia) as photographed in the Foraxx color palette.
The image was integrated from over 200 individual images shot over several nights in the light-polluted city of Cleveland, OH. The Ha, Oiii, and Sii channels were extracted and recombined in false-color using PixInsight astrophotography software.
501nm (Oxygen 3) and 655nm (Hydrogen alpha) wavelengths ±3.5nm each with equivalent exposure of 4 hr 40min,
672nm wavelength ±3.25nm (Sulfur 2) with equivalent exposure of 3hr 9min.
The original frames were shot using a Canon EF 200mm 1:2.8 L II lens (set at f/5) adapted to a ZWO ASI6200MC camera using a TS Optics M54 Canon Adapter.
Interstellar dust clouds and bright nebulae abound in the fertile constellation of Orion. One of the brightest, M78, is just left of center in this colorful telescopic view, covering an area north of Orion's belt. At a distance of about 1,500 light-years, the bluish nebula itself is about 5 light-years across. Its blue tint is due to dust preferentially reflecting the blue light of hot, young stars in the region. Dark dust lanes and other nebulae can easily be traced through this gorgeous skyscape. The scene also includes the remarkable McNeil's Nebula -- a newly recognized nebula associated with the formation of a sun-like star, and the telltale reddish glow of many Herbig- Haro objects, energetic jets from stars in the process of formation.
Image Credit & Copyright: Tony Hallas
B&W converted HDR using a Canon 7D and Canon 50mm F1.4 lens AEB +/-3 total of 7 exposures at F1.8. Processed with Photomatix.
High-dynamic-range imaging (HDRI) is a high dynamic range (HDR) technique used in imaging and photography to reproduce a greater dynamic range of luminosity than is possible with standard digital imaging or photographic techniques. The aim is to present a similar range of luminance to that experienced through the human visual system. The human eye, through adaptation of the iris and other methods, adjusts constantly to adapt to a broad range of luminance present in the environment. The brain continuously interprets this information so that a viewer can see in a wide range of light conditions.
HDR images can represent a greater range of luminance levels than can be achieved using more 'traditional' methods, such as many real-world scenes containing very bright, direct sunlight to extreme shade, or very faint nebulae. This is often achieved by capturing and then combining several different, narrower range, exposures of the same subject matter. Non-HDR cameras take photographs with a limited exposure range, referred to as LDR, resulting in the loss of detail in highlights or shadows.
The two primary types of HDR images are computer renderings and images resulting from merging multiple low-dynamic-range (LDR) or standard-dynamic-range (SDR) photographs. HDR images can also be acquired using special image sensors, such as an oversampled binary image sensor.
Due to the limitations of printing and display contrast, the extended luminosity range of an HDR image has to be compressed to be made visible. The method of rendering an HDR image to a standard monitor or printing device is called tone mapping. This method reduces the overall contrast of an HDR image to facilitate display on devices or printouts with lower dynamic range, and can be applied to produce images with preserved local contrast (or exaggerated for artistic effect).
In photography, dynamic range is measured in exposure value (EV) differences (known as stops). An increase of one EV, or 'one stop', represents a doubling of the amount of light. Conversely, a decrease of one EV represents a halving of the amount of light. Therefore, revealing detail in the darkest of shadows requires high exposures, while preserving detail in very bright situations requires very low exposures. Most cameras cannot provide this range of exposure values within a single exposure, due to their low dynamic range. High-dynamic-range photographs are generally achieved by capturing multiple standard-exposure images, often using exposure bracketing, and then later merging them into a single HDR image, usually within a photo manipulation program). Digital images are often encoded in a camera's raw image format, because 8-bit JPEG encoding does not offer a wide enough range of values to allow fine transitions (and regarding HDR, later introduces undesirable effects due to lossy compression).
Any camera that allows manual exposure control can make images for HDR work, although one equipped with auto exposure bracketing (AEB) is far better suited. Images from film cameras are less suitable as they often must first be digitized, so that they can later be processed using software HDR methods.
In most imaging devices, the degree of exposure to light applied to the active element (be it film or CCD) can be altered in one of two ways: by either increasing/decreasing the size of the aperture or by increasing/decreasing the time of each exposure. Exposure variation in an HDR set is only done by altering the exposure time and not the aperture size; this is because altering the aperture size also affects the depth of field and so the resultant multiple images would be quite different, preventing their final combination into a single HDR image.
An important limitation for HDR photography is that any movement between successive images will impede or prevent success in combining them afterwards. Also, as one must create several images (often three or five and sometimes more) to obtain the desired luminance range, such a full 'set' of images takes extra time. HDR photographers have developed calculation methods and techniques to partially overcome these problems, but the use of a sturdy tripod is, at least, advised.
Some cameras have an auto exposure bracketing (AEB) feature with a far greater dynamic range than others, from the 3 EV of the Canon EOS 40D, to the 18 EV of the Canon EOS-1D Mark II. As the popularity of this imaging method grows, several camera manufactures are now offering built-in HDR features. For example, the Pentax K-7 DSLR has an HDR mode that captures an HDR image and outputs (only) a tone mapped JPEG file. The Canon PowerShot G12, Canon PowerShot S95 and Canon PowerShot S100 offer similar features in a smaller format.. Nikon's approach is called 'Active D-Lighting' which applies exposure compensation and tone mapping to the image as it comes from the sensor, with the accent being on retaing a realistic effect . Some smartphones provide HDR modes, and most mobile platforms have apps that provide HDR picture taking.
Camera characteristics such as gamma curves, sensor resolution, noise, photometric calibration and color calibration affect resulting high-dynamic-range images.
Color film negatives and slides consist of multiple film layers that respond to light differently. As a consequence, transparent originals (especially positive slides) feature a very high dynamic range
Tone mapping
Tone mapping reduces the dynamic range, or contrast ratio, of an entire image while retaining localized contrast. Although it is a distinct operation, tone mapping is often applied to HDRI files by the same software package.
Several software applications are available on the PC, Mac and Linux platforms for producing HDR files and tone mapped images. Notable titles include
Adobe Photoshop
Aurora HDR
Dynamic Photo HDR
HDR Efex Pro
HDR PhotoStudio
Luminance HDR
MagicRaw
Oloneo PhotoEngine
Photomatix Pro
PTGui
Information stored in high-dynamic-range images typically corresponds to the physical values of luminance or radiance that can be observed in the real world. This is different from traditional digital images, which represent colors as they should appear on a monitor or a paper print. Therefore, HDR image formats are often called scene-referred, in contrast to traditional digital images, which are device-referred or output-referred. Furthermore, traditional images are usually encoded for the human visual system (maximizing the visual information stored in the fixed number of bits), which is usually called gamma encoding or gamma correction. The values stored for HDR images are often gamma compressed (power law) or logarithmically encoded, or floating-point linear values, since fixed-point linear encodings are increasingly inefficient over higher dynamic ranges.
HDR images often don't use fixed ranges per color channel—other than traditional images—to represent many more colors over a much wider dynamic range. For that purpose, they don't use integer values to represent the single color channels (e.g., 0-255 in an 8 bit per pixel interval for red, green and blue) but instead use a floating point representation. Common are 16-bit (half precision) or 32-bit floating point numbers to represent HDR pixels. However, when the appropriate transfer function is used, HDR pixels for some applications can be represented with a color depth that has as few as 10–12 bits for luminance and 8 bits for chrominance without introducing any visible quantization artifacts.
History of HDR photography
The idea of using several exposures to adequately reproduce a too-extreme range of luminance was pioneered as early as the 1850s by Gustave Le Gray to render seascapes showing both the sky and the sea. Such rendering was impossible at the time using standard methods, as the luminosity range was too extreme. Le Gray used one negative for the sky, and another one with a longer exposure for the sea, and combined the two into one picture in positive.
Mid 20th century
Manual tone mapping was accomplished by dodging and burning – selectively increasing or decreasing the exposure of regions of the photograph to yield better tonality reproduction. This was effective because the dynamic range of the negative is significantly higher than would be available on the finished positive paper print when that is exposed via the negative in a uniform manner. An excellent example is the photograph Schweitzer at the Lamp by W. Eugene Smith, from his 1954 photo essay A Man of Mercy on Dr. Albert Schweitzer and his humanitarian work in French Equatorial Africa. The image took 5 days to reproduce the tonal range of the scene, which ranges from a bright lamp (relative to the scene) to a dark shadow.
Ansel Adams elevated dodging and burning to an art form. Many of his famous prints were manipulated in the darkroom with these two methods. Adams wrote a comprehensive book on producing prints called The Print, which prominently features dodging and burning, in the context of his Zone System.
With the advent of color photography, tone mapping in the darkroom was no longer possible due to the specific timing needed during the developing process of color film. Photographers looked to film manufacturers to design new film stocks with improved response, or continued to shoot in black and white to use tone mapping methods.
Color film capable of directly recording high-dynamic-range images was developed by Charles Wyckoff and EG&G "in the course of a contract with the Department of the Air Force". This XR film had three emulsion layers, an upper layer having an ASA speed rating of 400, a middle layer with an intermediate rating, and a lower layer with an ASA rating of 0.004. The film was processed in a manner similar to color films, and each layer produced a different color. The dynamic range of this extended range film has been estimated as 1:108. It has been used to photograph nuclear explosions, for astronomical photography, for spectrographic research, and for medical imaging. Wyckoff's detailed pictures of nuclear explosions appeared on the cover of Life magazine in the mid-1950s.
Late 20th century
Georges Cornuéjols and licensees of his patents (Brdi, Hymatom) introduced the principle of HDR video image, in 1986, by interposing a matricial LCD screen in front of the camera's image sensor, increasing the sensors dynamic by five stops. The concept of neighborhood tone mapping was applied to video cameras by a group from the Technion in Israel led by Dr. Oliver Hilsenrath and Prof. Y.Y.Zeevi who filed for a patent on this concept in 1988.
In February and April 1990, Georges Cornuéjols introduced the first real-time HDR camera that combined two images captured by a sensor3435 or simultaneously3637 by two sensors of the camera. This process is known as bracketing used for a video stream.
In 1991, the first commercial video camera was introduced that performed real-time capturing of multiple images with different exposures, and producing an HDR video image, by Hymatom, licensee of Georges Cornuéjols.
Also in 1991, Georges Cornuéjols introduced the HDR+ image principle by non-linear accumulation of images to increase the sensitivity of the camera: for low-light environments, several successive images are accumulated, thus increasing the signal to noise ratio.
In 1993, another commercial medical camera producing an HDR video image, by the Technion.
Modern HDR imaging uses a completely different approach, based on making a high-dynamic-range luminance or light map using only global image operations (across the entire image), and then tone mapping the result. Global HDR was first introduced in 19931 resulting in a mathematical theory of differently exposed pictures of the same subject matter that was published in 1995 by Steve Mann and Rosalind Picard.
On October 28, 1998, Ben Sarao created one of the first nighttime HDR+G (High Dynamic Range + Graphic image)of STS-95 on the launch pad at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. It consisted of four film images of the shuttle at night that were digitally composited with additional digital graphic elements. The image was first exhibited at NASA Headquarters Great Hall, Washington DC in 1999 and then published in Hasselblad Forum, Issue 3 1993, Volume 35 ISSN 0282-5449.
The advent of consumer digital cameras produced a new demand for HDR imaging to improve the light response of digital camera sensors, which had a much smaller dynamic range than film. Steve Mann developed and patented the global-HDR method for producing digital images having extended dynamic range at the MIT Media Laboratory. Mann's method involved a two-step procedure: (1) generate one floating point image array by global-only image operations (operations that affect all pixels identically, without regard to their local neighborhoods); and then (2) convert this image array, using local neighborhood processing (tone-remapping, etc.), into an HDR image. The image array generated by the first step of Mann's process is called a lightspace image, lightspace picture, or radiance map. Another benefit of global-HDR imaging is that it provides access to the intermediate light or radiance map, which has been used for computer vision, and other image processing operations.
21st century
In 2005, Adobe Systems introduced several new features in Photoshop CS2 including Merge to HDR, 32 bit floating point image support, and HDR tone mapping.
On June 30, 2016, Microsoft added support for the digital compositing of HDR images to Windows 10 using the Universal Windows Platform.
HDR sensors
Modern CMOS image sensors can often capture a high dynamic range from a single exposure. The wide dynamic range of the captured image is non-linearly compressed into a smaller dynamic range electronic representation. However, with proper processing, the information from a single exposure can be used to create an HDR image.
Such HDR imaging is used in extreme dynamic range applications like welding or automotive work. Some other cameras designed for use in security applications can automatically provide two or more images for each frame, with changing exposure. For example, a sensor for 30fps video will give out 60fps with the odd frames at a short exposure time and the even frames at a longer exposure time. Some of the sensor may even combine the two images on-chip so that a wider dynamic range without in-pixel compression is directly available to the user for display or processing.
26 exposures of 10 minutes..
Camera : Canon EOS 1000D unfiltered.
Telescope : Takahashi FSQ-106ED refractor..
Mount : Takahashi EM-200..
Guiding : Orion Starshoot Autoguider on a William Optic Zenithstar 66SD refractor..
Outside temperature : 9°C.
Sensor temperature : 15°C to 17°C.
SQM : 21.6.
Software : auto-guiding with PHD Guiding, acquisition with Astro Photography Tool, processing PixInsight..
Location :L'Epine, South of France
Original 2D-image with the technical details:
astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2010/11/jones-1-extreme-dim-pla...
Other 3D-formats:
I increased the contrast and brightend the colour a bit in the Flame and Horsehead nebulae and then blended it with the first attempt. I also cleaned up the sensor dust a tad and ran it through Neatimage for noise reduction. And rotated just for a different perspective.
Please View This LARGE On Black
The brilliant streaks of light on this shot are background lighting seen through a large silken banner that was hanging in the air. The motion caused by the cloth caught in a breeze caused the slight blurs making them look more like gas clouds in space.
I was surrounded by these beautifully bright and colourful banners one evening in front of Dilli Haat in New Delhi, India. It had been raining on and off and since there was also slight breeze, the cloth was not completely wet and caught the falling droplets of rain in a slanting fashion across it, which led to these beautiful streaks being caused by the light in the background shining through the wet parts. This image was shot in portrait view and I have rotated it to a landscape view to bring forth the feeling of brilliant gaseous clouds out in deep space where stars are born. As mentioned by Wikipedia - Diffuse nebulae are called so since they are extended and have no well-defined boundaries. In visible light these nebulae may be divided into 'emission nebulae' and 'reflection nebulae', a categorization that depends on how the light we see is created.
LDN (Lynds Dark Nebula) 1001, 1002 & 1003 are dark nebulae found in the constellation Cygnus about 7 degrees 56 minutes 39 seconds southwest of the bright star Deneb. Also located in this region are some Herbig-Haro objects, specifically HH380, HH381, & HH382. In addition to these jewels, we captured a hint of the Red Nebulous Object (RNO) 127.
Dark nebulae, also known as absorption nebulae, are dark cloud regions, composed of sub-micrometer dust particles coated with frozen carbon monoxide and nitrogen gases, that effectively block the passage of visible light that lie behind them. These nebulae are great stellar nurseries where new stars are born.
Herbig-Haro objects are small regions of nebulosity that are formed when narrow jets of gas are ejected by young stars collide with other nearby clouds of gas and dust at speeds of several hundred kilometers per second. These objects are often found around a single star and aligned with its rotational axis. Their lifespan is relatively short, lasting no more than a few thousand years. Herbig-Haro objects were first observed in the late 19th century, but not recognized until the 1940s when George Herbig and Guillermo Haro determined they were a byproduct of the star formation process.
Telescope: Stellarvue Raptor SVR105 Apo @ f/7
Accessories: Stellarvue SFF7-21 flattener; Dew control by Dew Buster; Alnitak Flat Man
Mount: Takahashi EM-200 Temma2
Camera: QSI683wsg-8 CCD @ -15C
Guiding: Starlight Xpress Lodestar via PHD
Filters: Astrodon E-Series Gen II LRGB filters
Exposure: Lum: 12 x 15min. binned 1x1 ; RGB: 16 x 5min. binned 2x2 each channel
Acquisition: ImagesPlus 5.0 Camera Control
Processing: PixInsight 1.8
Date(s): August 21-22, 2014 & August 13, 2015
SQM reading (begin - end): N1:21.20 – 21.32; N2:20.15 – clouds; N3:21.46 – 21.46
Temperature (begin - end): N1:72.9ºF – 69.1ºF; N2:74.3ºF – 69.6ºF; N3:66.0ºF – 62.6ºF
Capture conditions: TRANSPARENCY: N1 = Avg 3/5, N2 = Poor 2/5, N3 = Avg 3/5; SEEING: N1 = Above Avg 4/5, N2 = Above Avg 4/5, N3 = Avg 3/5
Location: Fall Creek Falls State Park, Pikeville, TN, USA
This image from NASAs Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, highlights several star-forming regions. There are five distinct centers of star birth in this one image alone. Star-forming nebulae (called HII regions by astronomers) are clouds of gas and dust that have been heated up by nearby stars recently formed from the same cloud, and have appeared in previously featured WISE images.
The largest, brightest cloud, in the upper right is known as Gum 22. Its named after Colin Gum, an Australian astronomer who surveyed the southern hemisphere sky in the early 1950s looking for star-forming regions like these. He catalogued 85 new such regions, named Gum 1 to 85 (Gum Crater on the moon was also named in his honor).
Going counter-clockwise from Gum 22, the other catalogued nebulae in the image are Gum 23 (part of same cloud as 22), IRAS 09002-4732 (orange cloud near center), Bran 226 (upper cloud of the two at lower left), and finally Gum 25 at far lower left. There are also several smaller and/or more distant regions scattered throughout the image that have yet to be catalogued. Most of the regions are thought to be part of our local Orion spiral arm spur in the Milky Way Galaxy. Their distances range from about 4,000 to 10,000 light-years away.
Notice the very bright green star near the lower right portion of the image. You can tell its a star because it appears to have spikes sticking out of it (diffraction spikes like these are an optical effect caused by the structure of the telescope). Bright stars in WISE images are typically blue, so you know this one is special. Known as IRAS 08535-4724, its a unique type of stellar giant called a carbon star. Carbon stars are similar to red giants stars, which are much larger than the Sun, glow brightly in longer wavelengths, and are in the late stages of their lives. But they have unusually high amounts of carbon in their outer atmospheres. Astronomers think this carbon comes either from convection currents deep within a star's core, or from a nearby neighboring star, from which it is siphoned. Recent evidence suggests that a carbon star like this one will end its life in an extremely powerful explosion called a gamma-ray burst, briefly outshining the Sun a million trillion times.
The colors used in this image represent specific wavelengths of infrared light. Blue and cyan (blue-green) represent light emitted at wavelengths of 3.4 and 4.6 microns, which is predominantly from stars. Green and red represent light of 12 and 22 microns, respectively, which is mostly emitted by dust.
This photoshow video captures galaxies, nebulae and star clusters in different season.
#astrophotography #nebulae #galaxies #starclusters
Imaged from the Astronomical Society of Edinburgh's remote telescope facility in Trevinca, Spain.
Equipment:
Sharpstar 94 mm f/4.4 (with reducer) Triplet Apo Refractor
TS-Optics ToupTek Colour Astro Camera 2600CP
JTW mount
L Enhance filter
188 x 5 minute exposures (15 hours 40 minutes ).
imaged between the 29th of June and 8th of July 2025
25 Flats, 25 Dark Flats and 25 Darks
Processed with Pixinsight, Photoshop and Topaz De-noise
an HDR image of total 40 minutes (2 x 10min + 2 x 5min + 2 x 150sec + 2 x 75sec + 2 x 38sec + 2 x 18sec + 2 x 9sec + 3 x 4sec + 2 x 2sec + 2 x 1sec) exposure of Lagoon and Trifid nebulae in Sagittarius with IDAS-modified Canon EOS 5D-AP and Takahashi FSQ-106ED with reducer QE 0.73x on EM-200 temma 2 Jr. mount, PHD autoguided with TIS DMK21AF04 and custom designed off-axis guider at 11,000 feet above sea level on Mauna Loa, Hawaii 2007-08-10.
This is actually a running garden water fountain with a light in it that I have abstracted.
Molbak's Nursery, Woodinville, WA.
Nebulae - or "story of a survivor" :D
When I was still living with my parents I used to watch the night sky almost every night - I've seen quite some sunrise...LOL we lived near the sea, so in the summer it was nice to lay there and watch the stars and I always wondered what far galaxies would look like. So about 10 years or more ago I started to try and paint an imaginative Nebulae on self stretched canvas over wood - then I moved in with my soon to become husband (at his parents house...) an could not bring my artsy stuff with me.
"Nebulae" was left at my parents, then it disappeared. I've searched for it, it was no where to be found, they had not seen it - the Nebulae mystery!
Flash forward to 4 years ago when mom and dad moved up here and I helped them moving I found my "painting" nailed to the back of a closet - dad needed to fix that closet and he needed a wooden board so that's what he used...
*quoting* "...that's just a wooden board with some color on it a 'real painting' would be some pretty flowers or a seascape or something like that..."
I took it with me, but it was stained, the wood was curved and it was scratched...still I could not just throw it away....so it has spent the last 4 years in a corner behind my bird's cage. NOw the bird is gone...the "painting" is still here, it's a survivor! It's far from being a good painting, still I like the idea of it and finally got around to fix it and yesterday I was busy adding the final touches: gold foil and crackle paint and aging it, and some patina - oh what fun. It might not be the prettiest but it was fun! :) and yes, I'll hang it on my wall, it's a survivor, it deserves to be hung on a wall finally after all it's been thru!
This is the star Alnitak in Orion's Belt. On the top you can the the Flame Nebula (NGC 2024). Left of Alnitak is the reflection Nebula NGC 2023 and beneath that is the Horsehead Nebula (IC 434). Shot with an EOS 550D mounted to a Skywatcher 150/750 telescope. Exposure was around 16 minutes and 24 seconds with ISO 800.
The clear skies eventually appeared (six hours later than forecast) and allowed Eric to work a “night-shift” and capture the data to produce these beautiful images of nebulae which are in our pristine Scottish Highland nightscape.
Horsehead Nebula and Flame Nebula in the constellation Orion on 30.11.19
Celestron 11” SCT
Hyperstar lens
Canon 760D
Baader UHC-S filter
CGX autoguided Mount
6x300s + 2x600s exposure (total 50min)
DeepSkyStacker
PixInsight, Photoshop, and iPhone PS Express
Hubble's survey of planetary nebulae reveals surprisingly intricate, glowing patterns spun into space by aging stars: pinwheels, lawn sprinkler-style jets, elegant goblet shapes, and even some that look like a rocket engine's exhaust. These nebulae record the complex processes that happen in the final stages of a Sun-like star's evolution when it burns out and collapses to a white dwarf star. This is the Cat's Eye Nebula (NGC 6543), one of the first to be discovered. Credit: Hubble Heritage Team
Picture by NASA Goddard Photo and Video
LDN 10 and 12 are dark nebulae in Scorpius and Sagittarius respectively. Also in Scorpius seen here are LDN 1795 and 1798. There is also an open cluster at the bottom right called NGC 6451
Telescope - Skywatcher Esprit 100 ED Pro
Camera - ASI2600MC - Pro
Guiding - ASIAIR
Image Capture - ASIAIR
Mount - AM5
File - LDN 10 & 12 ShiftCol ABE BN PCC BlurExt NoiseExt SCNR Hist Curves Curves DSE.jpg
Filter - None
Exposure - 13 x 300s - 1 hour 5 mins total
Tenerife, Canary Islands
Date Taken - 18th September 2023
7,000ft above sea level
All processing in PixInsight
These are the Orion Nebula (Messier 42), the De Mairan's Nebula (Messier 43) and the Running Man Nebula (NGC 1977) in the constellation Orion. I used slightly different stacking settings and a different color balance to make the image look a little bit sharper and the colors a little bit less neony and to get the yellow-ish tint out. I also cropped it to a more monitor friendly aspect ratio. Shot with an EOS 550D mounted to a Skywatcher 150/750 telescope. Exposure was around 46 minutes and 45 seconds with ISO 800.