This popular fellow has just cleared the slew limit at nightfall. Surprisingly bright: we could see it in a 1 second exposure with the ED80 guide scope.
NGC 1760, 1763, 1769, etc in the Large Magellanic Cloud. 8 hrs H-alpha in 1 hour subs, 3 from a couple years ago and 5 from last night.
Processing using GoodLook 64: Set dark point, wavelet noise reduction, deconvolve 7 passes, arcsinh curve with slope of 200 in the darks, go starless, wavelet sharpen, replace stars.
Occupying all but the top left of the image, there is a giant face-on angry bee (Reason: Trish has been photographing a lot of these in the garden). NGC 1769 and NGC 1763 form the bee's eyes. Instead of storing the pollen behind its back legs, this astro-bee has a huge open mouth, full of star-pollen, open cluster NGC 1761. Its diaphenous left wing (our right) is composed of very faint and delicate shock fronts extending up to 1-2 o'clock. NGC 1773 is the smaller bright blob (an aphid perhaps) toward 10 o'clock from the bee.
Fred Vanderhaven has previously named the small bright structure at 3 o'clock as Thor's Other Helmet, for obvious reasons. It is also known as N11.
Aspen CG16M at -30C on 20" PlaneWave CDK. Moon almost full. With summer icumen in, and after a big storm, seeing was 2.2 to 2.8 sec arc. Field 36 min arc across. Original image is 0.55 sec arc/pixel.
Edit: The third thumbnail gives some additional identifications, taken from Cooper, et al, Night Sky Observer's Guide, vol 3.
Ha ha, gazumped me. i shot the same area last night, albeit with much less data. i did not see it as a Bee but the Thor item i did wonder about. My image was posted here this morning.
I agree the Cocoon areas are surprisingly bright in Ha.
Love your long focal length image and detail that all that time provides.
Ha ha, gazumped me. i shot the same area last night, albeit with much less data. i did not see it as a Bee but the Thor item i did wonder about. My image was posted here this morning.
I agree the Cocoon areas are surprisingly bright in Ha.
Love your long focal length image and detail that all that time provides.
Thanks, Glen. We have a tiny bit of OIII from last year. Your very fine image encourages us to look for SII as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cometcatcher
Such delicate filamentary structure. Nice one M&T.
Thanks, Kevin. The network of filaments seems very extensive.
Quote:
Originally Posted by gregbradley
Gee I like that. So detailed and bright and with a lot of clarity. Great processing as well.
Greg.
Cheers, Greg! Delighted you like it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by topheart
A fantastic composition!
Well done!
Cheers,
Tim
Hi, Tim! Composition-wise it begs for a mosaic, to get the juicy bits just out of field. We won't run out of interesting things to photograph.
Your imaged reminded me I had imaged this one a while ago. I dug it up, a full set of Ha O111 Sii and LRGB data!
Looking at your Ha image again I am amazed at what detail you have gotten there. Really top notch and goes to show long exposure at a dark site with large aperture and good tracking is still the formula and a deep well high QE large sensor.
The "tadpole" in particular is shown in amazing detail in your image. The 2 little jetlike forms are clear and your tadpole shows it as being a semitranslucent object.
The O111 regions are primarily just those thicker bright areas of nebula but the S11 does cover the filaments but is quite dim.
Greg
Last edited by gregbradley; 13-11-2016 at 07:55 PM.
Really nice MnT, there are so many little wispy Ha filaments populating the frame. Very nicely done, looking forward to a full colour version! This is still on my ToDo list
Check that out! looks awesome and yes it is a very bright bit of the LMC that one....those thin bright wavelet/decon worms are trying to hide....but at full size, I seeee them
Your imaged reminded me I had imaged this one a while ago. I dug it up, a full set of Ha O111 Sii and LRGB data!
Looking at your Ha image again I am amazed at what detail you have gotten there. Really top notch and goes to show long exposure at a dark site with large aperture and good tracking is still the formula and a deep well high QE large sensor.
The "tadpole" in particular is shown in amazing detail in your image. The 2 little jetlike forms are clear and your tadpole shows it as being a semitranslucent object.
The O111 regions are primarily just those thicker bright areas of nebula but the S11 does cover the filaments but is quite dim.
Greg
Thanks for that Greg. Found your excellent image. That will help give us some idea of what to expect. Perhaps we'll need 2x2 binning for SII, though Trish goes all disapproving if I mention binning at all.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Atmos
Really nice MnT, there are so many little wispy Ha filaments populating the frame. Very nicely done, looking forward to a full colour version! This is still on my ToDo list
Thanks muchly, Colin. Our previous effort a couple years ago was much shorter exposure and did not bring out the wispy bits.
Quote:
Originally Posted by strongmanmike
Check that out! looks awesome and yes it is a very bright bit of the LMC that one....those thin bright wavelet/decon worms are trying to hide....but at full size, I seeee them
Looks great regardless
Mike
Hi, Mike! Thank you. We'll have to go easy on the decon in the colour version.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RickS
A most impressive image, M&T! I'm pretty sure it's the Cookie Monster, though
G'day, Rick! The Cookie Monster would certainly explain all those stars in the open mouth. Spread the crumbs! Spread the crumbs!
[QUOTE=Placidus;1280851]Thanks for that Greg. Found your excellent image. That will help give us some idea of what to expect. Perhaps we'll need 2x2 binning for SII, though Trish goes all disapproving if I mention binning at all.
You mst have looked at an earlier version. I haven't finished processing the latest data set, but the Ha which I thought was excellent, does not match yours!
here is an interesting studyof the two little blighters in our two images N11L (Little Thors helmet) and N86 (Lionel Murphy)
Mike
Thanks hugely for the reference Mike. Fascinating. If I've understood correctly, the "wing" on Thor's Other Helmet is where the supernova ejecta have broken through a thin patch in the pre-existing interstellar medium, and a lobe of star-guts is hurtling toward us at great speed. Hope I've got that right. Must read it again.
On a reassuring note, the Placidus shot, at 1/6 the altitude, 1/8 of the aperture, 1/64 of the light gathering power, and not much of the budget, is (as the 70's pop group Yes put it) no disgrace, and yours is no disgrace either!
i did not see it as a Bee but the Thor item i did wonder about. My image was posted here this morning.
looks awesome and yes it is a very bright bit of the LMC that one....those thin bright wavelet/decon worms are trying to hide....but at full size, I seeee them 
