Comet 46P/Wirtanen close to the Pleiades (M45) on 16 December 2018 (imaged from Southern Africa, after a thunder shower and in between clear gaps in partly cloudy conditions).

I kept the exposures a bit shorter than I would have liked, and rather pushed the ISO a bit higher due to the cloud cover that was increasing. Luckily it was clear towards the North for just long enough to take the series of photos required for stacking, and despite the weather, the Astronomical Seeing was actually really excellent after the rain.

The Comet's faint tail was only visible in darker skies with longer exposures. This Comet has a beautiful bright green Coma (or head). The green color is caused by Cyanogen (CN) and diatomic Carbon (C2), which glows in the green part of the Electromagnetic Spectrum of Light when illuminated by the Sun in space.

Geocentric Distance:

0.0775 AU (Astronomical Unit).

30 Lunar distances.

11.5 Million km.

7.1 Million miles.

Gear:

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 200-500mm f/5.6E ED VR Lens.

Celestron AdvancedVX Telescope Mount.

Optolong L-Pro Clip-In Filter for Nikon.

Nikon D750 DSLR.

Lights/Subs:

46 x 60 sec. ISO 3200 exposures.

Calibration Frames:

30 x Bias

20 x Darks

Astrometry Info:

Center RA, Dec: 58.071, 22.397

Center RA, hms: 03h 52m 17.067s

Center Dec, dms: +22° 23' 47.549"

Size: 8.45 x 5.68 deg

Radius: 5.089 deg

Pixel scale: 19 arcsec/pixel

Orientation: Up is 130 degrees E of N

View an Annotated Sky Chart for this image.

View this image in the WorldWideTelescope.

Processing:

Pre-Processing and Linear workflow in PixInsight,

and finished in Photoshop.

Carl Sagan on Comets:

youtu.be/1hlONoWw39M

People's reaction to Comets, excerpt from Cosmos S01E04:

Time code: 13:18

"By 1910, Halley's comet returned once more. But this time, astronomers using a new tool, the spectroscope had discovered cyanogen gas in the tail of a comet. Now, cyanogen is a poison. The Earth was to pass through this poisonous tail. The fact that the gas was astonishingly, fabulously thin reassured almost nobody. For example, look at the headlines in the Los Angeles Examiner for May 9, 1910: "Say, Has That Comet 'Cyanogened' You Yet?" "Entire Human Race Due For Free Gaseous Bath. Expect High Jinks." Or take this from the San Francisco Chronicle, May 15, 1910: "Comet Comes And Husband Reforms." "Comet Parties Now Fad In New York." Amazing stuff! In 1910, people were holding comet parties, not so much to celebrate the end of the world as to make merry before it happened. There were entrepreneurs who were hawking comet pills. I think I'm gonna take one for later. And there were those who were selling gas masks to protect against the cyanogen. And comet nuttiness didn't stop in 1910." - Carl Sagan, Cosmos.

This image is part of the Legacy Series.

Flickr Explore:

2018-12-19

Photo usage and Copyright:

Medium-resolution photograph licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Terms (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). For High-resolution Royalty Free (RF) licensing, contact me via my site: Contact.

Martin

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44x60" subs with Canon eos 600d on 6 inches newtonian and Lxd75 mount. Capture with Nina and PHD 2 GUIDING. Processing with SIRIL and GIMP

Mount: NEQ6 Pro

Guider: Lacerta MGEN Autoguider

Camera: Sony a7s (centralDS)

Filter: LPS D1

Lens: Canon 70-200mm f4L

ISO 800 @ f4

Lights: 12 x 600 secs. & 5 x 300

secs.

Bias: 100

No darks & flats

DSS, PixInsight & Photoshop.

Fernando de Magallanes and his crew had more than enough time to study the southern skies during their famous trips around the world. As a result, two diffuse objects in the shape of a cloud, not visible to the inhabitants of the northern hemisphere, are now known as Las Nubes de Magallanes.

These clouds of stars are small irregular galaxies, satellites of our great

Milky Way galaxy.

The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC, by its most common acronym in English), photographed

above, it is only about 180,000 light-years away - the only known galaxy closer is the Sagittarius Dwarf.

Both the LMC and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) are linked to the Milky Way by a stream of cold hydrogen.

Author: Mario Poblete

Thanks Explore (#168). Position (#62)

With a nice streak of clear nights, I decided to see if my new Fujifilm X-T5 can improve my deep sky images with its 45 mpix sensor. This cropped image was post processed with PixInsight and Photoshop and it turned out quite acceptable despite taken in a city with a population of 65,000.

Tech Specs: Fujifilm X-T5, Nikkor 180mm f/2.8 @ f/5, iso 1000, exp 578 subs @ 30 sec (4.8 hour integrated time), guide Astrotrac, RAW.

Bortle skies 5.5, transparency 8 to 10, no moon. Elevation 6118 feet.

Click 2x to enlarge.

Picture of the day x 5

Imagine that you could ignore all the stars in the sky and see only the nebulae on the milky way.

How would it be?

Well, I captured IC 2944 on March 31st, and removed the stars to put more emphasis on this incredible emission nebula.

The Running Chicken Nebula, which looks more like Jar Jar Binks (I read that in a reply from my Twitter and I loved it!) is an emission nebula very close to Eta Carina, but much more tenuous!

This capture was made between the 30th and the 31st of March, with the moon practically 100% iluminated!

This was only possible due to Optolong's L-Enhance filter.

EXIF:

88x180s, ISO 1600 (4h24 total exposure)

Canon T6i modified

Long Perng 66/400mm Doublet

iOptron CEM25P

Guidance with QHY5L-II and ZWO 60/280

Optolong L-Enhance Clip in

Obs: I know that the removal of the stars is something very controversial, but take it easy. I also prefer the version with the stars, but I posted this one just for fun. 😉

English below

M16 come la precedente ma elaborata in HOO.

M16 like the previous one but processed in HOO.

Time: 2019/01/31

Place: York, Western Australia, Australia

Equipment: Canon 6D (mod) +Sigma 135art

Parameter: ISO1600, F2.8, 60s*78

A cropped Bi-Color processing test of Pickering's Triangle (or Pickering's Triangular Wisp) in the Veil Nebula (a Supernova Remnant).

NGC 6974 and NGC 6979 are luminous knots in a fainter patch of nebulosity on the northern rim between NGC 6992 and Pickering's Triangle.

Ha & OIII Bi-Color:

Photographed in the Hydrogen-Alpha and Oxygen III spectral wavelengths of light (Ha mapped to Red, OIII mapped to Blue, SynthGreen).

Narrowband filters:

H-Alpha

OIII

Processing:

Pre-Processing and Linear workflow in PixInsight, and finished in Photoshop (experimenting with Wavelets, Photoshop Actions and new bi-color processing techniques).

Astrometry Info:

nova.astrometry.net/user_images/1381741#annotated

RA, Dec center: 312.019287471, 31.6310735368 degrees

Orientation: 0.443881002562 deg E of N

Pixel scale: 2.4980010893 arcsec/pixel

Martin

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小鏡星系拍攝大作戰

年春初基本上是星系拍攝季節，沒有長焦鏡頭 (實際 300mm 以下對於天文攝影來說仍是廣角) 確實會失去拍攝動力，每張相片也只有丁點大小的深空天體，再多的曝光時間也沒有高的分辨率。是次旅程可以拍攝的目標不多，今次就以新的組合嘗試拍攝 M81 及 M82 星系。幸好高山環境加上高透明天的天氣令拍攝過程順利，只是拍攝時間不足。星空除了星系、星雲等外，在漆黑的背景實際也彌漫著不少暗星雲或暗塵，正式學名是 Integrated Flux Nebula (IFN)。IFN 星際雲的一種，其高密度可能會遮蔽發射星雲或反射星雲的光，如馬頭星雲。IFN 看似是一堆灰塵，不知道的還以為會是天空有雲層走過。

以往單反相機單張拍攝看不見的 IFN 也借助了 Sony A7S 的高 ISO 拍攝能力可以約略見到，需要較長的總曝光時間並經過疊合後才稍為清楚看見。實際上 IFN 在星空上十分常見，只是亮度問題，較為容易見到的是 M45 昂宿星團。不過 IFN 拍攝是地方先決的，希望今年天氣容許有更多拍攝。

Photo by siuba

Location: Yinna, China

Date：2016/03/02

Camera: Sony A7S

Telescope：Takahashi FS-60CB w/ Reducer (264mm f/4.2)

Tracker：Skymemo RS

Setting: 300s x 58

Process：Photoshop CC, PI

香港拍攝難度：★★ (五星最高)

建議鏡頭焦距：400mm+

適合拍攝月份：1 月 ~ 5 月 (香港)

大概方向：北斗七星附近

A Hydrogen-Alpha + Oxygen III + Sulphur II Narrowband widefield image of the Cygnus Wall. The North America Nebula (NGC 7000 or Caldwell 20) is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus, close to the star Deneb. The remarkable shape of the nebula resembles that of the continent of North America, complete with a prominent Gulf of Mexico.

The Cygnus Wall:

The Cygnus Wall is a term for the "Mexico and Central America part" of the North America Nebula. The Cygnus Wall has the most concentrated star formation in the nebula. The North America Nebula and the nearby Pelican Nebula, (IC 5070) are in fact parts of the same interstellar cloud of ionized hydrogen (H II region). The nebula complex is estimated to be about 1,800 light-years from Earth.

Gear:

William Optics Star 71mm f/4.9 Imaging APO Refractor Telescope.

William Optics 50mm Finder Scope.

Celestron SkySync GPS Accessory.

Orion Mini 50mm Guide Scope.

Orion StarShoot Autoguider.

Celestron AVX Mount.

QHYCCD PoleMaster.

Celestron StarSense.

QHYCFW2-M-US Filterwheel (7 position x 36mm).

QHY163M Cooled CMOS Monochrome Astronomy Camera.

Tech:

Guiding in Open PHD 2.6.3.

Image acquisition in Sequence Generator Pro.

Lights/Subs:

2 Stage Cooled CMOS

Imaged at -25°C

Gain: 20

Offset: 80

Narrowband:

S = 12 x 600 sec. 16bit FITS.

H = 12 x 600 sec. 16bit FITS.

O = 12 x 600 sec. 16bit FITS.

Calibration Frames:

50 x Bias/Offset.

25 x Darks.

20 x Flats & Dark Flats.

PixelMath RGB Channel Combination:

PixInsight Expression:

R = SII

G = (Ha*OIII)*1.5

B = OIII

Image Acquisition:

Sequence Generator Pro with the Mosaic and Framing Wizard.

Plate Solving:

Astrometry.net ANSVR Solver via SGP.

Processing:

Pre-Processing and Linear workflow in PixInsight,

and finished in Photoshop.

Photographed in the following wavelengths of light:

Optolong SHO Narrowband filters:

OIII line 500.7nm (6.5nm bandwidth)

H-Alpha line 656nm (7nm bandwidth)

SII line 672nm (6.5nm bandwidth)

Astrometry Info:

View the Annotated Sky Chart for this image.

Center RA, Dec: 314.764, 44.279

Center RA, hms: 20h 59m 03.425s

Center Dec, dms: +44° 16' 43.955"

Size: 2.27 x 1.55 deg

Radius: 1.375 deg

Pixel scale: 5.11 arcsec/pixel

Orientation: Up is 97.9 degrees E of N

View this image in the World Wide Telescope.

Martin

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Hi all

Here is an image taken last night in the constellation of Cepheus.

This is the Wizard Nebula, NGC 7380.

The scope is the sharpstar 61 edph II and the camera, a ZWO ASI 585 mc pro, on the Lxd75 mount.

Stacking of 53 images of 180 seconds with Svbony CLS filter.

Acquisition with Nina+phd2

Siril+Graxpert processing

Good Skies

Júpiter y el Río lechoso.

En el centro de esta imagen se puede apreciar una “estrella” brillante de color blanco, resulta ser el planeta gigante gaseoso Júpiter, ubicada actualmente en la constelación de Ofiuco. A la izquierda lo acompaña la Via láctea, se le llamo así ya que al ojo desnudo se aprecia como una mancha blanca que atraviesa el cielo nocturno ya que nuestros ojos no tienen la capacidad de ver los colores de estas estructuras que están a miles de años luz, por eso, a través de la cámara se pueden desfigurar los colores reales de estas estructuras. El color amarillo-anaranjado son cientos de miles de estrellas viejas ubicadas hacia el centro galáctico, las nebulosas negras son nubes densas que se encuentran entre nosotros y el centro galáctico, al ser tan densas bloquean la luz que se encuentra detrás de estas nubes, los colores rojizos y rosados son principalmente regiones de formación estelar, regiones Hll, donde las estrellas masivas y brillantes ionizan el gas circundante haciéndolas brillar de estos colores.

Imagen capturada el 12/05/2019.

Exif:

📷: Sony A77

Sigma 10-20 F3.5

20mm, F4, Iso 800

21 frames x 122s

Apilada por Sequator

Procesada con adobe Lightroom y Photoshop.

Autor: Diego Tapia

M45 The Pléiades. This open cluster is in the Taurus constellation. This picture totals 94 subs of 120 seconds with no filter. 50 darks, 50 flats and 100 biases (sensor temp : -10°C).

Capture with NINA

Processing with SIRIL, Graxpert and Gimp

Caméra : ZWO ASI 585 MC PRO

Telescop : Sharpstar 61 EDPH V2

Mount : Meade LXD 75

Guidecam and guidescope : QHY 5L II C + SVBONY miniguidescope

SH2-308: The Dolphin-head Nebula, also designated as Sharpless 308, RCW 11, or LBN 1052, is an H II region located near the center of the constellation Canis Major, composed of ionised hydrogen. It is about 8 degrees south of Sirius, the brightest star in the night

Location: Chile

Telescope: CHI-4, 50 cm F3.6 Reflector

Filters: O-III

3 light frames stacked in Deep Sky Stacker for 30 min exposure.

Processed in Photoshop.

Data Acquired: Telescope live

English below:

M16 o nebulosa Aquila nella costellazione della Coda del Serpente presenta, al suo centro, la formazione nota come i Pilastri della Creazione resa nota al Telescopio Spaziale Hubble.

Somma di pose guidate da 10 minuti per un totale di 2 ore e 20 minuti con filtro dualband Antlia ALP-T 5nm. Telescopio newton 150/600 con correttore Tecnosky 0.95x, camera Tecnosky Vision 571C, montatura Eq6-R Pro, elaborazione Pixinsight.

M16, or the Eagle Nebula, in the constellation Serpens (Coda del Serpens), features, at its center, the formation known as the Pillars of Creation, discovered by the Hubble Space Telescope.

Sum of 10-minute guided exposures for a total of 2 hours and 20 minutes with an Antlia ALP-T 5nm dual-band filter. 150/600 Newtonian telescope with a Tecnosky 0.95x corrector, Tecnosky Vision 571C camera, EQ6-R Pro mount, and Pixinsight processing.

Finally some good weather around here. I managed to capture 1h of this magnificent emission nebula.

Canon T6i astromoded + Optolong L-Pro Clip EOS + Long Perng 66/400mm + ioptron CEM25P

63x60s, ISO 1600.

150 darks, bias em flats each.

Maybe I'll try to add more light to this project, if the sky allow.

The Gecko Nebula, officially cataloged as LBN 437, is a reflection nebula located within the constellation Lacerta (appropriately meaning "the Lizard") that resembles a gecko crawling across the sky. The nebula is illuminated by nearby young stars, reflecting light in delicate, bluish shades.

It is situated near the much larger Sh2-126 emission nebula, which is visually marked by striking red hydrogen-alpha filaments that overlap and create a striking contrast with LBN 437.

This nebula is a popular target for astrophotographers due to its complex structure, which includes both dark molecular clouds (beige-brown here) and reflection regions that are illuminated by interstellar light, offering unique textures and colors.

A total integration of 202 * 180s = 10.1 hours with the Neodymium filter and an OSC camera to capture both the reflection and extra Ha simultaneously; processing in PixInsight included extracting a synthetic Ha layer, boosting the contrast and re-blending together in a HaRGB palette.

Prints, cards and more are available via the website: shiny.photo/photo/LBN-437--The-Gecko--Lacerta-447f51b975e...

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春季必拍星系

春天是一個適合拍攝星系的季節，而 M81 和 M82 是熱門拍攝目標之一。除了星系本身其獨特的吸引力外，視場中其實彌漫著塵埃，這些塵埃需要累積更多光子才能顯現出來。此相片只用上年代久遠的 350D (800 萬像素) 拍攝，細緻度確實還是差了一點，雜訊亦十分可怕，唯有在後制上花一點功夫...

Photo by Timmy Wong

Location：Xingming Observatory

Camera：Canon 350D mod.

Telescope：Tamron 300/2.8 mod.

Mount：Vixen GPD (+SS2K)

Exposure：240s x 132

香港拍攝難度：★★ (五星最高)

建議鏡頭焦距：400mm+

適合拍攝月份：1 月 ~ 5 月 (香港)

大概方向：北斗七星附近

This is a re-processing of my data acquired in summer. The picture shows Lagoon and Trifid nebulae (M8 and M20) in Sagittarius.

Every time I study something new in post processing, I try to revisit my old projects and try to improve them. This time it is a new star reduction script which works great for widefield shots like this.

NGC 891 est une galaxie spirale vue par la tranche dans la constellation d'Andromède. Elle a été découverte par William Herschel en 1784.

Autour on distingue de nombreuses petites galaxies, dont les NGC 906, 909, 910, 911, 912, 913... rassemblées dans un amas (Abell 347)

Photo prise le 13/09/2020

77*300s : 6h25'

Newton SkyWatcher 200/1000

Monture EQ6-r pro

Canon 1000D défiltré partiel

Correcteur de coma Baader MPCC Mk III

Autoguidage OAG + ZWO ASI 290mm mini

ASIAIR Pro

PixInsight + Photoshop CC

A galaxy no less :)

NGC 2903 is a barred spiral galaxy about 30 million light-years away in the constellation Leo, discovered by William Herschel. And it's a faint bugger, or at least the outer bits are - too faint for my pathetic skies really.

This is the first image I've done using dithering. Not sure how much difference it made as I wasn't able to give it enough subs anyway. Certainly increased the session time, that's for sure! I'll reserve judgement on dithering :)

SW ED80/EQ5

Canon 500D modded, Baader Neodymium filter

3 hrs 15 mins of 180 sec subs, iso 1600

Acquisition: APT

Guiding: Quickcam Pro4000/9x50 finderscope, PHD/EQMOD/AstroEQ

Stacked in DSS (3 x drizzle) and processed in CS5.

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獵戶座大星雲 Great Orion Nebula

冬夜王者獵戶座是每年也要拍一下才安心。本在十月的時候拍了一輯，但未到心中的效果只好先存著。幸好今個月再到山上遇上好天氣再繼續補了些光子，今次算是滿意了。

除了主角 M42 獵戶座大星雲及其旁邊的 NGC1977 走佬人星雲外，這次還希望演示一下週邊暗一點的星雲。如相片右邊很漂亮的連串IC428 / IC427 / NGC1999；走佬人上方的 IC420；還有 M42 上方的那一抹 VDB42。

M42 的顏色動態很寬，在處理上有很大彈性。我個人偏好 M42 中央光亮耀眼一點，顯出這個造星區的威力。不知大家喜歡那一種風格呢？

Photo by - Michael Leung

日期：2015-10-18 / 2015-12-18

地點：梅州陰那山

相機：CentralDS 600D @ -10c / -22c

望遠頭：Borg 90FL w/0.72x reducer 360mm f/4

赤道儀：iOptron ZEQ25 / Guided QHY5LII Mono

設定：ISO1600, 240s x58 (Core 30s / 10s / 2.5s x15) (Dark, Bias)

香港拍攝難度：★ (五星最難)

建議鏡頭焦距：200 ~ 400mm

適合拍攝月份：10 月 ~ 2 月 (香港)

M16 aka The Eagle Nebula located in the central region of the Milky way. It is made of diffuse emission nebula, the region is about 7500 Light-years from our place and is very active in star formation. I took it during my April 2019 visit to Namibia. The region is also famous because of its central region names "Pillars of Creation" when was taken by the Hubble telescope.

In the editing part I used only the RGB photos and for the Luminance part I used the Red channel to point the details, All the RGB channels taken in BIN1.

So it is RRGB photo :)

Photo info:

Red as Luminance BIN1: 3x5min = 15min

RGB BIN1: 3x5Min for each channel for color.

Total RGB - 45Min

Equipment used:

Telescope: ASA 12'' F3.6

Mount: DDM 85 Unguided

Camera: FLI 16200 Mono

Filters: Astrodon

Thanks for watching

Haim Huli

English:

The great Carina nebula, also known as NGC 3372, is a jewel of the southern sky that spans more than 300 light-years and one of the most extensive regions of the galaxy where stars form. In the same way as the larger Orion nebula, smaller and more northern, the Carina nebula is easily visible to the naked eye, although it is at a distance of 7,500 light years (5 times farther).

This magnificent telescopic close-up reveals details of the bright central filaments of the interstellar gas region and clouds of dust. The Carina nebula hosts young and extremely massive stars, such as the stars of the open cluster Trumpler 14 (in the center) and the still enigmatic variable Eta Carinae, a star with more than 100 times the mass of the sun. Eta Carinae is the brightest star just below the dusty Nebula of the Keel (NGC 3324). The X-ray images indicate that the great Carina nebula has been an authentic supernova factory; in fact, Eta Carinae could be on the verge of a supernova explosion.

Author: Mario Poblete

Español: La gran nebulosa de Carina, también conocida como NGC 3372, es una joya del firmamento meridional que abarca más de 300 años luz y una de las regiones más extensas de la galaxia donde se forman estrellas. Del mismo modo que la gran nebulosa de Orión, más pequeña y septentrional, la nebulosa de Carina es fácilmente visible a simple vista, aunque se encuentra a una distancia de 7.500 años luz (5 veces más lejos).

Este magnífico primer plano telescópico revela detalles de los filamentos centrales brillantes de la región de gas interestelar y las nubes de polvo. La nebulosa de Carina acoge estrellas jóvenes y extremadamente masivas, como las estrellas del cúmulo abierto Trumpler 14 (en el centro) y el todavía enigmática variable Eta Carinae, una estrella con más de 100 veces la masa del sol. Eta Carinae es la estrella más brillante que hay justo debajo de la polvorienta nebulosa de la Quilla (NGC 3324). Las imágenes de rayos X indican que la gran nebulosa de Carina ha sido una auténtica fábrica de supernovas ; de hecho, Eta Carinae podría encontrarse al borde de una explosión de supernova.

Autor: Mario Poblete

Taken with a TMB92L, Hutech-modified Canon T3i DSLR, Orion SSAG autoguider and 50mm guidescope, and Celestron AVX mount. Consists of 50 240-second light frames and 28 240-second dark frames, all at ISO 800, as well as 32 flat and 50 bias frames. Captured with BackyardEOS, stacked in DeepSkyStacker, and processed in Photoshop.

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蜘蛛星雲 Tarantula Nebula NGC2070

蜘蛛星雲位於劍魚座大麥哲倫星系邊上，離我們於約十六萬光年。它是本星系群中已知的最活躍最大的造星區，直徑近1000光年。如果把它拉近放到獵戶座大星雲 (離我們最近的大形造星區) 的位置，即離我們約 1500 光年處，它會在天空中占據 30 度約 60 個滿月的大少， 光度甚至可在地上做成影子。

近年有研究表示，這個區域的造星運動這麼劇烈，是由於多個星團碰撞結合所引致，甚至可能是大小麥哲倫星系的重力牽近所造成的。

Photo by Michael Leung

Location：Lake Pukaki, New Zealand

Camera：CentralDS 600D @ -15c

Telescope：Borg 90FL / 0.72 Reducer (360mm f/4)

Mount：iOptron ZEQ25 guided QHY5LII Mono

Exposure：ISO1600, 240s x11 (Core 30s x20)

拍攝難度：★★ (五星最高)

建議鏡頭焦距：300mm+

適合拍攝月份：9月 ~ 3月 (南半球)

大概方向：大麥哲倫星系附近

Also known as the 'Eye of

God' or 'The eye of Sauron', The Helix Nebula is a planetary nebula located in the constellation Aquarius, lying at an approximate distance of 700lyrs away and a radius of 3lyrs across.

What we are seeing in this image is a star at the end of it's evolutionary process on its way towards becoming a white dwarf.

The Nebula has an apparent magnitude of 7.5, but is not visible to the naked eye easily, due to it's low surface brightness.

Shot from Hunter Valley Area north of Sydney Australia in Sept 2017

Exposure Time: 5mins per exposure/shot equalling:

2hrs 30mins of Luminous Channel

1hr 15mins each of RGB at 3hrs 45mins for colour channels

Total Image exposure of : 6hrs 15mins

Notes: this image was taken under difficult sky conditions and also could have done with alot more data, however the skies decided to not clear enough for me to get more data so there we have it for this year at least.

Equipment Used:

Telescope: William Optics 110Triplet

Mount: Paramount MYT

Camera: Atik One+OAG

Filters: Astronomik

Software Capture: The SkyX

Software Processing: Pixinsight

Voici la Voie lactée se levant derrière le Château de Vêves en Belgique.

Le château de Vêves, construit au bord d'un petit affluent de la Lesse, a des origines anciennes.

En effet, Pépin de Herstal y avait déjà élevé une villa dans la seconde moitié du VIIe siècle afin d'être plus près de l’ermitage de Saint Hadelin à Celles.

La villa fut ensuite transformée en une petite forteresse par ses différents successeurs au IXe siècle. Cette forteresse fut rasée en 1200 et reconstruite en 1220 par la famille Beaufort qui en fit un château-fort plus puissant.

Détruit par les Dinantais au xve siècle et rétabli aussitôt, le château eut encore à subir les ravages causés en 1793 par les révolutionnaires français.

Au XVIIIe siècle, la famille de Liedekerke-Beaufort restaura le château, lui donnant son aspect actuel.

Avec les châteaux de Beersel, de Bouillon, de Corroy, de Horst, de Gand et de Lavaux, il constitue un des plus beaux châteaux médiévaux de Belgique.

En janvier 2018, le château de Vêves remporte le prix du patrimoine préféré des wallons.

-📷 : Canon EOS R6 Mk II.

-Canon 16-35mm f/2.8.

⚙️: 30 secondes d'exposition, ISO 2500.

-️️ : Traitement : Lightroom & Photoshop.

-📅 : J'ai pris cette photo le 10 Mai 2024 à 3h30.

The Andromeda Galaxy also known as Messier 31, M31, or NGC 224, is a spiral galaxy approximately 780 kiloparsecs (2.5 million light-years) from Earth. It is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way.

a two-pane mosaic in hydrogen alpha.

Captured more of this awesome nebula and combined the images, it kinda looks more like its name now, i think.

H-alpha only.

ED80/ATK16HR - Astronomik ha clip filter.

5 min exposures x approx 10 each pane.

Small Magellanic Cloud in Ha and OIII Narrowband

For a ”Northern Lad” (in its broadest sense) seeing the SMC (visible in the Southern Hemisphere) is a wonderful new experience. This rendition using only Hydrogen alpha and Oxygen III emission data shows a myriad of structures - Bubbles of hydrogen gas (red/orange) sometimes filled with wisps of oxygen (blue) all driven by the intense radiation of newly forming stars. Massive tendrils that mark the remains of one Supernova after another … awe inspiring indeed. The massive galactic star field has been heavily reduced (in intensity) to enable the narrowband emission data to be more visible.

The data was collected on two wonderful visits to the Hakos Guestfarm, Namibia.

Celestron RASA 11

10 Micron GM1000 HPS

Moravian C1X 61000-M

The image is a three panel mosaic.

NGC 6727

An extremely intriguing area of the night sky. NGC 6727 is a combination of dark, reflection and emission nebula, with designations IC4812, NGC 6726 and NGC6729, along with the globular cluster NGC 6723 in the constellation Corona Australis that is approximately 500 light years distant. The extended field shows several regions of faint Ha-emission as well as several small reflection nebula. Of particular note is the beautiful semi-circular Ha-emission peppered with some faint wisps of reflection nebula (not OIII), excited rather than illuminated by the nearby star and demonstrating quite profoundly that hydrogen is a major constituent of the surrounding dust. Also to be seen is a relatively "large" spiral galaxy at the bottom of the nebula (Designation: PGC-62700, 250.000.00 light years distant). The Region NGC 6727 is actually the tip of a considerably larger dust cloud (4 panel mosaic) extended for quite away beyond the right hand edge of the single image. OIII and SII emissions are particularly present in the bright core of the system. A wonderful target and certainly not the last time I will be paying a visit.

The data was collected by myself using a remote rented system in Australia (Martin Pugh)

Takahashi FSQ106 EDX fitted with a 645RD F3.6 reducer

Player One Poseidon-m Pro Camera

10 Micron GM1000HPS

Total acquisition time (35,75 hrs for the single close-up image):

R: 17400 sec

G: 19800 sec

B: 15000 sec

H: 30600 sec

O: 22500 sec

S: 23400 sec

Image Of The Day 14.08.2024 - Astrobin

Here an image of the Cave Nebula, catalogue reference Sh2-155, an emission nebula in the constellation of Cepheus. It is embedded in a larger region containing emission, reflection and dark nebula. The brightest part of the nebula has an apparent magnitude of 7.7, being situated about 2400 ly from Earth. The somewhat unusual rendition shown here is derived from 6 filters in total: Hydrogen-alpha, sulphur-II and oxygen-III ultra-fast narrowband filters and g´, i´, and z-s´ photometric filters. The g´ filter (400-550nm) captures nicely the reflection nebula, whilst the i´ (700-845nm) and z-s´ (820-920nm) filters transmit infrared light at different wavelengths. The data from these two filters then needs to be colour-mapped to a visible region of the spectrum. The following colour mapping has been applied to create this particular image: g´ mid-blue, O-III cyan, Ha yellow, S-II sunset orange, i´ crimson, z-s´ purple. Stars are from the monochrome S-II integration.

Calibration, Registration, Integration in APP, further processing to taste in PS.

The viewing conditions were not as good as was hoped (Rhön, Germany) with intermittent thin cloud and dew that fell with a particularly heavy "thud" 😉 , still most of the data was usable ...

Total time: 11.5 hrs / ISO 400

Celestron RASA11

10Micron GM1000 HPS

SIGMA fp L (monochrome)

Baader ultra-fast narrowband and SLOAN/SDSS photometric filters

This is my first image using my new autoguider.

Taken with a TMB92L, Canon T3i DSLR, Orion SSAG autoguider and 50mm guidescope, and Celestron AVX mount. Consists of 29 120-second light frames and 21 120-second dark frames, all at ISO 800, as well as 15 flats. Captured with BackyardEOS, stacked in DeepSkyStacker, and processed in Photoshop. Diffraction spikes courtesy StarSpikes Pro.

NGC 6188 / NGC 6193 / NGC 6164 / NGC 6165

In the heart of the southern skies, nestled within the constellation Ara, approximately 4000 light-year from Earth, lies a celestial story of life and death played out in the glowing embrace of the nebulae NGC 6188 and NGC 6164, illuminated by the brilliant stars of the open cluster NGC 6193. NGC 6188 stretches as a veil of stardust, where newborn stars emerge from towering pillars of dark gas, sculpted by the intense winds of their luminous companions in NGC 6193, into figures commonly known as the “Fighting Dragons”. Together the “Dragons” overlook the symmetrical lobes of the “Dragon’s Eye“, NGC 6164 and NGC 6165, which surround the massive O-Type star HD 148937. This star, in an advanced stage of its life has ejected material, that it now illuminates, with a further delicate outer viel of Oxygen (blue) being clearly visible. Together the region shows many aspects of the Vita Cealestis.

The second (and final) data set that was collected by myself using a rented remote system in Australia (Martin Pugh)

Takahashi FSQ106 EDX fitted with a 645RD F3.6 reducer

Player One Poseidon-m Pro Camera

10 Micron GM1000HPS

The image is a 3 panel mosaic with a total acquisition time of 62 hrs

Starburst Galaxy. 12 million light years distant in the constellation Ursa Major. Mag 8.4

Equipment: Celestron 8 inch Newtonian Reflector on an AVX mount with Canon 500d.

Guided with Starshoot Autoguider on a ZWO 60mm guidescope Exposures: 4x480s, 4x540s, 4x600s with Darks and Bias frames.

Stacked in DSS and finished in CS2.

This is my early try of Rosette this season. I collected data during two nights. Started in Abastumani on October 19th, but could only capture H-alpha channel as the sun rose. I left Abastumani the next day but wanted to complete this project, so I drove outside Tbilisi again last night to collect the remaining channels. Here is it, the result of 2h32min total exposure!

Camera: QSI583

Scope: TS80APO 480mm f/6

Mount: iEQ30 Pro

with guiding

H-alpha 16*300sec bin 2x2

R,G,B 8*180sec bin 2x2

assembly & processing in PixInsight

little retouch in Lightroom

Special thanks to David Dvali

Total exposure : 43 minutes

86x30 sec subs(no dark,bias flat frames)

Camera : Nikon D5600

Lens : 70-300 mm kit lens @300mm f6.3

Mount : iOptron Skyguider pro

Bortle scale :Class 4

HaRGB image

Ha 16c300sec

R,G,B 8x180 each

TS80APO (480mm f/6)

QSI 583wsg

iOptron iEQ30 pro mount

My first attempt at astrophotography. fotografiabymiguel.com/2022/11/27/2022-my-first-astrophot...

Data Acquired: Telescope live 25 light frames all in FITS format stacked in Deep Sky Stacker and then processed in photoshop. Here are two versions the one highlighting the outer edges more is processed in Lightroom mobile

The Andromeda Galaxy, also known as Messier 31, M31, or NGC 224 and originally the Andromeda Nebula, is a barred spiral galaxy approximately 2.5 million light-years from Earth and the nearest large galaxy to the Milky Way.

Total exposure: 4h 10m 0s

no.of frames - 25

M31 Andromeda galaxy is the nearest large galaxy next to our own Milky Way. It contains around 1 trillion stars and is 2.5 million light years away from Earth.

⏱️ 10h36m (159 x 4min ISO 400 frames)

Kaunas, Lithuania (Bortle 7 skies)

📅 December 2021 - January 2022

Setup:

📷 Canon EOSR unmodified

🔭 Skywatcher Explorer 150PDS

️ Baader MPCC and IDAS LPS-D2 filter

⚙️ Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro

↖️ Guiding with ZWO ASI 120MM Mini + ZWO 30mm Mini Guide Scope + PHD2

💻 Stacked and edited with DeepSkyStacker and PixInsight

Leo Triplet.

...................

It is a small group of galaxies located in the constellation Leo, located 30-35 million light-years away from Earth. This group is one of the most popular targets for both astrophotography and visual observations, January-April being the best time to image these galaxies.

As a brief individual presentation, these 3 galaxies are as follows:

NGC 3628 (the one on the left), also known as the Hamburger Galaxy, due to its shape as we see it - is about 35 million light-years away and is surrounded by a cloud of stellar dust that hides most of the galaxy.

Messier 65 (top right in the attached image) - is the smallest of the 3 galaxies and also the closest to Earth ("only" 31 million light-years away).

Messier 66 (the one on the right) - is the brightest galaxy in the group and is 35 million light-years away. According to specialists, this galaxy is the largest in the group, with a diameter of about 95,000 light-years, almost as big as our galaxy.

Technical info :

Mount: Skywatcher EQ6R Pro.

Telescope: Skywatcher 150PDS

Camera: ASI 533MC Pro.

Total exposure: 9 hours ( 180 light frames x 3 min ).

Stacking with Deep Sky Stacker.

Edit in Pixinsight.

Location : my Bortle 6+ backyard.

A large but relatively faint, emission nebula in Vulpecula. it contains the small reflection nebula NGC 6820 and the open cluster NGC 6823. It is most well known for the prominent pillar in the brighter core, though many other fascinating substructures can be seen in the dimmer parts of the nebulosity. The main body of the nebula is crossed by a dark cloud.

The image was taken with Ha (mapped to red), S-II (mapped to yellow/green), O-III (mapped to cyan) ultra-narrowband filters as well as with the g’ photometric filter (mapped to blue) to pick up the faint reflection nebulosity. The O-III signal is weakest but present in the bright core. Stars are from the sulfur-II plates and are thus without colour. Processing in AstroPixelProcessor, StarTools, PixInsight and Photoshop.

SIGMA fp L (Monochrome)

Celestron RASA 11

10 Micron GM1000 HPS

4,5 hrs, ISO 400, 620mm, F2.2

SIMPLE = T / file does conform to FITS standard

BITPIX = -32 / number of bits per data pixel

NAXIS = 3 / number of data axes

NAXIS1 = 5154 / length of data axis 1

NAXIS2 = 3443 / length of data axis 2

NAXIS3 = 3 / length of data axis 3

EXTEND = T / FITS dataset may contain extensions

COMMENT FITS (Flexible Image Transport System) format is defined in 'Astronomy

COMMENT and Astrophysics', volume 376, page 359; bibcode: 2001A&A...376..359H

MIPS-FHI= 0.248219 / Upper visualization cutoff

MIPS-FLO= 0 / Lower visualization cutoff

BZERO = 0 / offset data range to that of unsigned short

BSCALE = 1 / default scaling factor

DATE = '2023-07-01T16:13:35' / UTC date that FITS file was created

DATE-OBS= '2023-06-17T20:30:51' / YYYY-MM-DDThh🇲🇲ss observation start, UT

INSTRUME= 'Canon EOS 600D' / instrument name

OBSERVER= ' ' / observer name

TELESCOP= SHARPSTAR 61EDPH II / telescope used to acquire this image

ROWORDER= 'BOTTOM-UP' / Order of the rows in image array

XPIXSZ = 4.29 / X pixel size microns

YPIXSZ = 4.29 / Y pixel size microns

XBINNING= 1 / Camera binning mode

YBINNING= 1 / Camera binning mode

FOCALLEN= 274.445 / Camera focal length

CCD-TEMP= 0 / CCD temp in C

EXPTIME = 299 / Exposure time [s]

STACKCNT= 13 / Stack frames

LIVETIME= 3887 / Exposure time after deadtime correction

EXPSTART= 2.46011e+06 / Exposure start time (standard Julian date)

EXPEND = 2.46011e+06 / Exposure end time (standard Julian date)

ISOSPEED= 800 / ISO camera setting

CTYPE1 = 'RA---TAN' / Coordinate type for the first axis

CTYPE2 = 'DEC--TAN' / Coordinate type for the second axis

CUNIT1 = 'deg ' / Unit of coordinates

CUNIT2 = 'deg ' / Unit of coordinates

EQUINOX = 2000 / Equatorial equinox

OBJCTRA = '20 57 40.492' / Image center Right Ascension (hms)

OBJCTDEC= '+44 30 4.522' / Image center Declination (dms)

RA = 314.419 / Image center Right Ascension (deg)

DEC = 44.5013 / Image center Declination (deg)

CRPIX1 = 2601 / Axis1 reference pixel

CRPIX2 = 1731 / Axis2 reference pixel

CRVAL1 = 314.419 / Axis1 reference value (deg)

CRVAL2 = 44.5013 / Axis2 reference value (deg)

CDELT1 = -0.000895698 / X pixel size (deg)

CDELT2 = 0.000895518 / Y pixel size (deg)

PC1_1 = 1 / Linear transformation matrix (1, 1)

PC1_2 = 0.000953977 / Linear transformation matrix (1, 2)

PC2_1 = -0.00053159 / Linear transformation matrix (2, 1)

PC2_2 = 1 / Linear transformation matrix (2, 2)

PLTSOLVD= T / Siril internal solve

HISTORY mean stacking with winsorized sigma clipping rejection (low=3.000 high=3

HISTORY Rotation (90 deg)

HISTORY Rotation (90 deg)

HISTORY Extraction du gradient (Correction : Subtraction)

HISTORY Résolution astrométrique

HISTORY SCNR (type=neutre moyen, qté=1.00, préserve=true)

HISTORY Photométrie

HISTORY Rehaussement de la saturation (quantité=0.39)

HISTORY Recadrage (x=0, y=20, w=5154, h=3443)

HISTORY Transf. histogramme (mid=0.007, lo=0.016, hi=1.000)

HISTORY Déconvolution

END

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早兩天難得半晚天清，來試試每年秋季也要拍一下的M31。 M31（仙女座星系 Andromeda Galaxy） 是我們的一個鄰居星系，距離我們約250萬光年，大小約是銀河系的兩倍。因相信跟我們銀河系很相似，而常常被作為研究比較之用。

曝光訊號不太夠細節有點粗，留待日後好天再增加一點曝光時間吧！

Photo by Michael Leung

日期：5/9/2015 @ 北潭涌

相機：CentralDS 600D @ -1c

鏡頭：Borg 90FL w/0.72x reducer 360mm f/4

追星儀：iOptron ZEQ25

導星：Guided QHY5LII Mono

其他：IDAS LPS-D1 Filter

設定：ISO 1600, 240sec x 23 (Darkframe / Bias)

Another Astro Adventure with Ozark Bill, while Bill had his focus set on the Rosette Nebula NGC 2237 and Star cluster NGC 2244.

My focus was the Horsehead Nebula IC 434 and its accompanying nebula NGC 2024, the Flame Nebula.

I imaged these targets on 2/17/2023 - Waning Crescent phase. This is the phase where the moon is less than 50% illuminated but has not yet reached 0% illumination (which would be a New Moon).

Imaging started at 715pm on 2/17/2023 and ended at 1209am 2/18/2023.

The image I am sharing is a stack of 65 images, taken in HaRGB

The Horsehead Nebula (IC434) is about 1400 light-years away from Earth, which means it takes 1400 years for light to travel from the nebula to our home planet. A light-year is a unit for measuring very long distances. One light-year is nearly six trillion miles, and it’s the most common unit of measure for distances of objects in outer space because most of them are extremely far away.

The nebula has a dark appearance because of dense dust and hydrogen gas that block other stars behind it. It is radiation from a hot star which causes hydrogen gas in a nebula to glow with a pinkish-red color, plus there are often other colors due to different elements. But mostly they're red.

Located near Alnitak, the leftmost star in Orion’s Belt, there are these two iconic nebulae which are always a favourite sight during the winter months of the Northern Hemisphere. The Horsehead nebula was officially discovered in 1888 by a Scottish astronomer named Williamina Flemming. She was at the Harvard College Observatory when she spotted the nebula, and she recorded its image on a photographic plate. The nebula was given the name Barnard 33 at that time, and it was described as a dark mass. It’s huge! Current estimates put it at 4 light-years tall by 3 light-years wide. In miles, it is around 24 trillion miles tall by 18 trillion miles wide.

Summary of facts about the Horsehead Nebula

*The Horsehead nebula is about 1400 light-years distant from Earth.

*It can be found just south of the belt in the constellation Orion.

*The Horsehead nebula is one of the most well-known astronomical objects because of its interesting shape.

*The iconic horse head image stands out because it is surrounded by the bright IC 434 nebula that is part of a larger nebula construct.

*The Horsehead nebula is about 4 light-years tall and 3 light-years across.

*In time, the nebula will be dispersed by ultraviolet light from stars in the vicinity.

*A 2001 poll of amateur astronomers revealed that it was their favorite celestial object.

WORC 51 + ASI533MC cooled to -15°/Gain 100.

A total of 70 lights for a total of 291 minutes or 4.83 hours

20 x 300-sec EXP / 5 x 600-sec EXP / 30 x 180-sec / 10 x 10-sec

Processed using: Pleiades Astrophoto PixInsight

An underrated area of the Gamma Cygni nebula IC 1318 - vdB 134 is a reflection nebula, reflecting the light of ω1 Cygni about 869 ly distant.

Toward the bottom of the frame is planetary nebula PLN 86 + 5 1.

128 * 3min lights OSC data with a Skywatcher 8" Quattro and Neodymium filter, lots of biases, flats and darks processed in APP, PI and Affinity.