The Little Ghost nebula

[Paul Haese]

This is a somewhat intriguing planetary nebula. Some of the professional images of it are taken in OIII, Ha and Nitrogen. This gives an almost Hubble palette of the object. So I thought I would try doing likewise. Alas that was not capable out of my meager instrument. The SII in this object is very faint and took quite a few hours just to get a reasonably bright image. In then end it did not add anything to the image.

The object is found in Ophiuchus at around 2500 light years. It is reasonably faint at 12.9 magnitude and would most likely have only shown a ring when observed by William Herschel. The fainter halo would not have been visible at all; perhaps only a faint nodule or two seen. An interesting challenge for anyone to try.

The image contains Luminance, Ha, OIII, and RGB. Totally 22.6 hours of integration.

Click here for the larger image.

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

The long exposure has pulled out some as-you-say intriguing outer arches and rings, different in H-alpha and OIII.

Very tiny details extracted and perfect star field.

The beastie itself looks like a cross between the City of Sydney anchor logo and Hercule Poirot's moustache.

[Ryderscope (Rodney)]

A fascinating object and definitely worthy of exploration. Nicely rendered Paul.

[Atmos (Colin)]

Great little PN, with all of the exposure you’ve put into it it no longer looks like a faint little sucker
Very well done

[multiweb (Marc)]

Nice pic. Any reason you didn't use the RC on this one?

[Joshua Bunn (Joshua)]

Small PN, you've done well Paul. The colours look good. What's the lower right brightness?
Josh

[Paul Haese]

Thanks guys for the comments, appreciated

Originally Posted by multiweb

Nice pic. Any reason you didn't use the RC on this one?

Hi Marc, the RC is not currently in commission at the observatories. It is on the dining room floor in the house down there. It will go into commission once I find a decent flattener for it. I have two mounts at present and five telescopes. Both the AG12's are in commission on the mounts.

Originally Posted by Joshua Bunn

Small PN, you've done well Paul. The colours look good. What's the lower right brightness?
Josh

Josh, that I think is a rather bright O star just out of the field of view.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by Paul Haese

I have two mounts at present and five telescopes. Both the AG12's are in commission on the mounts.

You need more mounts or side by side plates.

[Paul Haese]

Originally Posted by multiweb

You need more mounts or side by side plates.

I am working on getting another Bisque mount, but won't go back to side by side again.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by Paul Haese

I am working on getting another Bisque mount, but won't go back to side by side again.

Would one PME take two AG12s piggy backed? One focuser down and the other top up.

[Paul Haese]

Originally Posted by multiweb

Would one PME take two AG12s piggy backed? One focuser down and the other top up.

Hmmm, probably not. The overall weight would be somewhere around 60kgs without including counter weights. It would be huge setup though.

[topheart]

Well done Paul!
Cheers,
Tim

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Yeah an intriguing little blighter and you've done a good job.

The HST image of it is very cool too.

Your result is quite interesting, I used SIIHaOIII too when I shot it three years ago and the structures in our respective images look quite different, I'm thinking your RGB might have been incorporated differently?

Either way a worthwhile, all be it very tiny, target

Mike