The Flaming Butterfly (NGC 6302)

[Dave882]

NGC6203, aka the Butterfly or Bug Nebula, is a beautiful planetary nebula in Scorpius located approx 3400ly away. It is a bi-polar PN which has given rise to its fascinating structure - taking on the shape of a butterfly with outstretched wings. The central star is estimated to be around 250,000 degrees, one of the hottest known stars. The core of the nebula is exceptionally bright, but once tamed, almost seems to take on the shape of the butterfly's body.

This has been captured using just over 15hrs of data in 2min subs with the L-Ultimate filter, and approx 1.5hrs of RGB of 30sec subs for the stars. Channel extraction and LP removal in APP, and additional post processing in PI. I was quite ruthless in which data to keep in order to extract as much detail as possible. I opted for the HOO combination as I thought it suited the target well.

I was interested to see that there was quite a bit of Ha nebulosity extending well beyond the main body of the PN, as well as some background Ha snaking through the image too. More hours would certainly reveal this better, but I think it may just clutter the scene.

Larger Version Here
(https://storage.googleapis.com/dso-browser.com/astrophotography/picture-de98fc7b02508eeebe83dcc843c6652e-original.jpg)
C14 non edge @f7 with the Starizona reducer LF
EQ8 pro
Asi2600mc pro gain-100
Asi220mm / celestron OAG
ZWO EAF
ASIAIR pro / APP / PI

Comments greatly appreciated! Thanks for dropping in!

[TrevorW]

That is a great shot of a tiny dim target :)

[strongmanmike]

Great image Dave, cool level of detail and I like the colour palette too :thumbsup:

Mike

[kosborn]

Great detail. Really good image of a challenging target! That dual band filter works really well with the one-shot colour camera.

Cheers, Kevin

[Dave882]

Thanks guys I appreciate the comments! The L-Ultimate really does perform well on emission targets in the light-polluted skies. Although even it can't help when the seeing just isn't there for long fl detail so I ended up scrapping quite a bit of data on this project unfortunately...

[Startrek]

Dave,
Yet another really challenging target but exposing some excellent detail and colour
That C14 is the perfect scope for these PN’s , big or small
Well done again !!
Only an observation but I reckon you could stretch it a tad more as the background looks a little bit black clipped ?? it’s quite inky black ??

Martin

[Leo.G]

Wow, great shots yet again Dave!

[Dave882]

Cheers Leo glad you like it!
Martin- thanks for your constructive comments, yes I do agree with you on the background brightness. Not sure why I made it that dark as normally I prefer the opposite. Maybe my eyes were a bit out of calibration while I was doing this one. Might have a look see if I can fix that…

[Bodon]

Wow looks real nice!

[Dave882]

Thanks Steve much appreciated!

[Ryderscope]

A very well composed and captured butterfly with lots of excellent detail. Definitely a great catch :thumbsup:

[Dave882]

Thanks so much Rodney!