Helix outer bow shocks: 38 hrs H-alpha

[Placidus]

We've previously tried even 50 hours unbinned, trying to get more detail in the family of faint bow shocks to the east of the Helix, with only partial success.

Here we've taken 34 hours of 2x2 binned H-alpha, plus another 4 hours of unbinned for the bright core details.

Original full-size image here
(https://photos.smugmug.com/Category/Planetary-Nebulae/i-HvQ5hRR/0/708899f2/O/Helix%20Ha%202x2%2034%20hrs%2C%201x 1%204%20hrs.jpg)

The routinely imaged "eyebrow" about half-way out, arcing from 9 to 12 o'clock came out well. It looks like a breaking ocean wave, with a hollow cave-like three-dimensional extension toward 9 o'clock.

Far beyond the eyebrow, we can see that the much fainter main chevron-shaped bow-shock toward 9 o'clock has many smaller shock fronts within it.

Toward 10 o'clock, there is a pair of very fine and sharp, large, concentric round-nosed bow shocks, which have rarely, if ever, been imaged before.

In a long arc from about 10 o'clock to 12 o'clock is another almost implausibly sharp and thin bow shock.

The more familiar bright blunt conical extension toward 7 o'clock is shown to have a lot of internal detail and texture, vaguely reminiscent of fox fur.

The extensions toward 4 o'clock is seen to be much more flocculent, not shocked.

We're kinda chuffed, because we don't think we've seen a deeper rendition of these fine outer bow shocks. The 2x2 binning exercise was worthwhile.

Field is a tight 3 panel mosaic 43 min arc wide, north up. Aspen CG16M at -30C on 20" PlaneWave CDK on MI-750 fork. Acquisition using our own custom software. Processing with our GoodLook 64.

Best,
MnT

[Atmos]

2x2 binned 34 hours with a 20"... Oh my god!
:thumbsup: :prey2:

[troypiggo]

Wow that's deep! Think you're right - certainly the deepest Ha I've seen.

[traveller]

Amazeballs M&T.
Deep and detailed as usual.
Bo

[strongmanmike]

Well the original version you guys did a while ago was already mighty good and deep but comparing the two, this has widened the field a little, added some body to the main neb and consolidated some of the fainter/finer features you reveal back then. Do you plan to do another panel to the right?..there are some faint extensions to reveal on that side too :thumbsup:

Very cool :)

Mike

[RickS]

Fantastic, M&T!

[LewisM]

Omfg!

[Bassnut]

wow, thats amazingly deep, fantastic image, very well done!

[Retrograde]

Wow! Fantastic depth. :eyepop:

[Mighty_oz]

Great shot there :) Detail I've never seen before, thanks for the effort.

[markas]

As others have already said, I have not seen this extent and detail ever before.

What a superb reference image!

Mark

[multiweb]

Awsesome Mike! That's deep alright. You gotta look to the right now. :thumbsup:

[alpal]

Hi Mike & Trish,
Wow - that's the best Ha image of the Helix Nebula that I can find on the web.
The bar has been set higher.

cheers
Allan

[Stevec35]

Puts my humble effort to shame guys. I should have gone 2x2. A great Ha helix!

Cheers

Steve

[Placidus]

Colin, Troy, Bo, Rick, Lewis, Fred, Pete, Marcus, Mark, Marc, Allan, Steve,

Thank you all so much for your encouragement.

Mike and Marc, yes we must add a half-panel on the right. The sky is clear tonight but the moon is fat and bright so it's chicken, wine, and movies.

This image, Mike and Trish came up with quite different final versions, so what we've presented is a 50:50 blend of the two. Democracy at work.

Very best,
MnT

[peter_4059]

Wow. Top stuff.

[SimmoW]

APOD ALERT!!!!! INCOMING, INCOMING.

Beautiful stuff team, this deserves recognition. If that kinda thing floats your boat that is. Some amazing patterns in the outer region.

[Octane]

Wow, you guys! That is incredible! I've never seen those extensions before. And, 20" -- sheesh!

I've been gathering data on this baby in bi-colour over the last couple of months, as well, but, I doubt I'm going to get anywhere near showing so much detail, let alone the image scale, lol.

When's the colour due? :D

H

[PRejto]

Wow, one of the most impressive images I've ever seen. Bravo!

Peter

[gregbradley]

Great work. It looks terrific. As far as doing a right hand panel, don't worry you got it all, there is nothing more on the right side there.

Greg.

[atalas]

Quite an amazing Helix guy's....well done indeed :thumbsup:

[Ryderscope]

OMG indeed. Much fine detail to behold.

[RobF]

Whew. Tour de force.
Wonderful image!

[willik]

I thought you could not bin ha unless you are the huble telescope unless you got the super scope
Martin

[vlazg]

Congratulations M & T, a truely superb image, the depth is incredible.

I don't mind a glass or two myself but chicken wine ???

[Placidus]

Peter, Simon, Humayun, Peter R, Greg, Louie, Rodney, Rob, Martin, George,

Thanks so much. :)

Greg and Mike, we'll probably add a bit of a sliver of a panel on the right just to even the image up a bit, for Andy C.

Humayun, it's certainly tempting to try some binned OIII and SII. No idea whether we'll see anything at all out in the far fringes. Worth a peek.

Simon, many thanks! Our boat would be bobbing gently if only it would rain. We're in a mini drought out here!

George, we've trained our two chooks and Boris the otherwise useless rooster to tread grapes. Meanwhile, we've fixed the missing commas.

Once again, thanks to everyone.

MnT

[marc4darkskies]

Outstanding depth M&T!! Very impressive indeed! :thumbsup:

[strongmanmike]

When you go to the trouble of shooting THIS deep..sheesh, t'is deeper than the Mariana! (not the spaghetti - my favourite BTW) :eyepop:...why not include the whole thing?? :thumbsup: :)

Mike

[Peter Ward]

You've set a new bench mark for this one....for comparison I've attached an image I captured a few years ago (some 32 hours worth) with my Honders.

Your image reveals so much more!

Bravo M&T !

[Placidus]

Thanks muchly, Marcus.



Will do. It would be great to know why the east and west sides of the Helix look so different. Moving through pre-existing medium? Pre-existing medium assymetrically dense?



Thanks, Peter. Took us a while to find the original of your image. It is very good.

[Camelopardalis]

Truly epic M&T :eyepop:

[Paul Haese]

Huge image scale Mike, and blitzed my effort of 60 hours with my FSQ. Size does matter. Just for comparison I have included my Ha image. This is a full res crop. Your scale and brightness is the new standard here Mike. :thumbsup:

[Regulus]

Oh my...

[Placidus]

:)



Thanks muchly Paul. Yours captures most of it, and does seem to show some additional faint material at your top left, off the screen for us.



Thanks Trevor!

[cometcatcher]

Trucking smell!


(Or something that rhymes with it ;) )

[Placidus]

:D and thank you Kevin!

[rustigsmed]

awesome work M& T!
colour? going to add to it each year?
just fantastic!

Russ

[Placidus]

Thanks Russell. Yes, definitely planning to add OIII and SII. Not sure that we'll be able to detect it so far out though.

[Somnium]

okay, now you are just showing off! amazing

[Placidus]

We try to please. Thank you! :)

[topheart]

A wonderful effort to show the fainter out regions like this.
Well done!
Congratulations!
Cheers,
Tim

[Placidus]

Thanks Tim. We had a lot of fun with this one.

[Shiraz]

Just plain astonishing. Established a very high bar with this one folks - well done.

[Placidus]

Thanks muchly, Ray. That is very encouraging.

Best,
MnT

[Slawomir]

Fantastic image M&T !

Would be interesting to see if combining data from other significant integrations already done by various IIS members would add any noticable detail.

[Placidus]

Thanks Suavi!


In the spirit of pooling images, the deepest shot that we can find (http://www.galex.caltech.edu/media/glx2012-04f_img01.html) is a GALEX Spitzer WISE infrared and ultraviolet combo. Their article says that it looks amazingly similar across a huge wavelength range.

It does show faint extensions to the right that are out of field in our image.

We'd love to know of other very deep images, either amateur or professional.

Best,
Mike and Trish

[Ryderscope]

Gee whiz MnT!! An incredible effort and a result that justifies the effort.

[dpastern]

M&T - hubble called - they want their telescope back!

Amazingly detailed image. Superb!

[Placidus]

Thanks muchly, Rodney!



Thanks D. NASA just turned up with a giant catapault on a low loader. They're tightening the slings now. They refused our offer of a full jar of vegemite as a swapsie. :D

[Andy01]

I'll just echo what's already been said about this superb, amazing result!
... and put in a request for a full deep NB version now please ;)

[Placidus]

Thanks muchly, Andy. Much appreciated.

[Atmos]

http://www.astrobin.com/full/311097/C/

Here is your competition MnT ;)

[strongmanmike]

Naaah Col, while that's pretty ok, that's little better than my now rather mediocre version done back in 2009 (was a marathon effort for me then) with the 6" Starfire and insensitive and noisy 11000 chip.

Mike and Trish's image on the other hand...well, it is clearly in the orbiting space observatory league!! :eyepop: see attached image by GALEX!

:prey2:

Mike

[Placidus]

Thanks Colin, that's a lovely shot. They used a 20 inch scope, same 16803 camera chip, hugely higher and drier location, and nice colour, but far fewer hours of H-alpha than ours.



Thanks Mike! We had some pretty strong wind here the other day, and it almost was an orbiting space observatory.

[strongmanmike]

Matchin it with today's CFHT APOD (https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap180103.html) he he he...

Mike :thumbsup:

[Placidus]

Thanks Mike. We did submit it. Your kind comparison is as close as we've come to notoriety so far. :D

Theirs is much sharper, especially showing the far distant galaxies more clearly, but I reckon the outermost and faintest H-alpha bow shocks toward top left are clearer in our image.