A tip from Justin Tilbrook led me to shoot Planetary Nebula NGC246 The "Skull Nebula" last night. It really does look like a skull! There are at least two galaxies in the field, NGC255 bottom right and PGC2689 lower left.
"A planetary nebula in the constellation Cetus. NGC 246, nicknamed the Skull nebula, was discovered in 1785 by William Herschel. It lies approximately 6° north-northeast of the 2nd-magnitude star Beta Ceti and about 1.5° south-southeast of 4.8-magnitude Phi1 Ceti.
The nebula is relatively small and dim (11th-magnitude). In a small telescope the nebula's feeble light is almost overpowered by the foreground stars superimposed on it. Larger telescopes show the nebula more clearly, especially with an oxygen III filter. NGC 246's central star (a white dwarf) is worth monitoring. In 1930, its photographic magnitude was as bright as 9th magnitude. In 1969 it dipped to 11.2 and today it shines at about 12th magnitude. This star is also is part of a binary pair. "
Distance is 1600 light years.
Details: Bintel 8" F4 Newtonian, 490 x 30 seconds unguided with a Pentax K-5, HEQ5 Pro. Stars are not quite round as my alignment was a bit off last night.
Thanks Rick. Yep, everything from now on should be from the new observatory. In time I'll get the 10" going in it also for a bit more fire power. Having an observatory is a dream come true.
I've never done any good with this one - I've only tried it at F10 I will try f6.3 next.
The F4 scope gets these images fast - I might have to get one, but then with the clouds it's been over a month since I've used what I have.
Thanks Tony. Well, at F4 the subs can be kept quite short. As long as there's a 30 second gap or 3 in the clouds, then imaging is possible. That's why I like the short subs. The tropics in summer are always cloudy.
