Near and far nebulae in Carina

[andyc (Andy)]

I do like the pairing of NGC3576 and NGC3603, a mixture of sprinkling stardust and two contrasting nebulae within our Galaxy. The NGC3576 complex on the right is relatively nearby, 6,000 light-years away and relatively small. Its pinkish colour is emission from hydrogen gas. NGC3603 is much larger and much further away. The cluster at the centre of NGC3603 is one of the most massive in the Milky Way, containing truly massive stars. One is nearly 3 million times more luminous than the Sun, and 132 times the mass. NGC3603 is reddened by intervening dust, hinting that it is much further away, it's some 22,500 light-years distant.

Larger view of the pair here

100% view of NGC3603

100% view of NGC3576


Larger view of the full frame

One of my longer exposure projects and I'm fairly happy with it - 45 x 5 minutes (3hr 35min), ISO800, EOS 60D, darks, flats and bias subtracted. 200mm f/5 Newtonian on HEQ5 pro mount, OAG & StarShoot Autoguider. Stacked and processed in PixInsight and Photoshop.

[Atmos (Colin)]

Nicely shot Andy! The Liberty is showin up quite nicely

I think this is one of those regions I prefer in narrowband (less stars) but yours is a veritable star field!

[multiweb (Marc)]

Another nice shot Andy. I always liked the difference in density in the starfield between the top and bottom of the field in this area. Shows nicely in RGB but is lost in NB. Greta shot.

[billdan (Bill)]

Beautiful photo Andy, your OSC image is one of the few I've seen of this area. Mostly we see the more dramatic NB versions.

Thanks for providing the background information to the region as well, something I didn't know.

Cheers
Bill

[Paul Haese]

It's certainly a different look in RGB mode. Your colour whilst muted looks pretty nice and demonstrates the dust intervening between 3603 very well.

[andyc (Andy)]

Thanks Paul, Bill, Marc and Colin. It's a very different field in RGB compared to some of the fabulous narrowband shots that pull out the nebulous tendrils (including Paul's recent one if I recall right). The stars and the variation in richness of star fields with the dust come out a lot, though with my DSLR, I could do with extra bit depth to reduce the star saturation.

Bill, I get the feeling NGC3603 is a much more interesting object than its relative lack of fame visually!

[RickS (Rick)]

Great to see both objects in the same FOV with the added novelty of RGB colour. Nicely done, Andy!

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Don't see these imaged in RGB colour very often, a nice change for sure

Mike

[andyc (Andy)]

Originally Posted by RickS

Great to see both objects in the same FOV with the added novelty of RGB colour. Nicely done, Andy!

Thanks Rick, is it a novelty when RGB is all you have?

Originally Posted by strongmanmike

Don't see these imaged in RGB colour very often, a nice change for sure

Mike

It's certainly very different as a scene to yours Mike! Though a bit more of your sharpness would help, I think I can tighten up the tracking a tad.