In my desperation to produce some new images despite the rather cloudy conditions in Auckland lately I went through my archives and stumbled across a forgotten data set from March, most of it gathered just two days after full Moon and in rather poor seeing conditions (FWHM >3").
The result was a nice colourful image of the not so often imaged Spiral Planetary Nebula, NGC 5189:
Link to large image
Link to full resolution image (3.5M)
About the image:
The colourful and intricately shaped Spiral Planetary Nebula (NGC 5189) is located up to 3000 light years away in the Southern constellation Musca. It is a very complex nebula with a morphology not well understood by scientists.
Several expanding bubbles of gas appear in its centre, emitting a predominantly blue-green light from ionised Oxygen. Surrounding these bubble structures lies the large sweeping spiral shape, brilliantly shining with a magenta hue from ionised Hydrogen, similar to that of traditional emission nebulae.
The full frame image shows the small nebula nestled amongst countless reddish stars in Musca, a densely populated region of our Milky Way galaxy.
Image details:
Date: 7th and 19th March 2014
Exposure: LRGB: 113:105:105:25 mins, total 5 hours 48 mins @ -25C
Telescope: Homebuilt 12.5" f/4 Homebuilt Serrurier Truss Newtonian
Camera: QSI 683wsg with Lodestar guider
Filters: Astrodon LRGB E-Series Gen 2
Taken from my observatory in Auckland, New Zealand
Hope you enjoy this colourful festive nebula!
Regards,
Rolf