Lambda Orionis - Meissa

[Ryderscope]

Lambda Orionis (a.k.a. Meissa) is a bright star in the constellation of Orion (the Hunter) shining at magnitude 3.54 and is the brightest star that we see in this image. Meissa and its companions make for a nice grouping embedded within the HII region - Sharpless 2-264 (the Angel Fish Nebula).

Data for this image were captured over December and January for a total of 15 hours of integration time. Camera is a QSI683 and the OTA is a Tak TSA120.

I had previously imaged SH2-264 in 2016 with the QSI camera and a Canon 100mm lens which captures the entire Angel Fish nebula. A link to this earlier image is included in the Astrobin post.

Link to Astrobin post here. (https://astrob.in/2qvn8b/0/)

Comments and critique welcome.

Clear skies,
Rodney

[Dave882]

Wow that’s really beautiful. I imagine the capture and processing would have been quite delicate to retain the brilliant star glow as well as the extremely faint surrounding ionised clouds. The star-colour in that field is amazing too! Well done!!

[TrevorW]

Noice :)

[strongmanmike]

Ah cool, so that'd be the head of Orion huh? Lovely :)

Mike

[Ryderscope]

Many thanks all.

@ Dave, I did spend some extra time on the processing to try and capture the faint star glow whilst trying to retain the details in the surrounding nebula. Always a delicate balancing act.

@ Mike, yes - the head of Orion it is! See attached screenshot from Stellarium. The small grouping of stars (cluster?) is visible with the naked eye as well.

[Startrek]

Another great capture Rodney
You certainly target some unique areas of the night sky
Well done !
Martin

[Ryderscope]

Thanks Martin, we do like to go off the beaten track looking for new and interesting objects.

CS,
Rodney