NGC6164 - An Egg in Ara

[Dave882 (David)]

NGC6164 is normally relegated to the sidelines of some wide-field shots, but it certainly is a fascinating target in its own right. It consists of a huge O-type central star, a bipolar emission rich in Ha, and a surrounding Oiii cloud. There's some really interesting features including (my favourite) a Oiii-rich cone-shaped detail just beside the central star. I'd so love to know how this formed!!

This is first light for a (new to me) Optolong L-Ultimate filter sitting on my c14 @ 2700mm. No soft starts here - this was 9hrs from the B7 suburbs, with the full moon literally beaming down the tube. Add to this that the Oiii in this target is so damn faint. So I'm pretty happy with how it's performed.

I'll call this my first iteration. I think the next attempt (when I can find the time) on this target will be approx 30hrs integration to see if those Oiii shells come out better. For the moment though, I'm happy with how it's shaping up.

Details:
116x 300sec subs (full moon)
Celestron OAG
C14 non edge @f7 with the Starizona reducer LF
EQ8 pro
Asi2600mc pro gain 100 (L-ULtimate Fileter)
Asi290mm / celestron OAG
ZWO EAF
ASIAIR pro / APP / LR
Binned (scaled) 80% in processing

Here's a bigger version.

PS- Also - another first light on this target for my ZWO EAF. This has been sitting in the cupboard for almost 12months while I procrastinated getting it set up. It did indeed take quite a bit of troubleshooting but quite happy with how it performed. Certainly made a difference as I was able to leave the rig running on auto all night and wake up to much better data. I'm still a little paranoid that some of the focus runs are maybe not 100% so will experiment with settings going forward and keep checking against the bahtinov every now and then...

Comment/critique or suggestions welcome.
Thanks for looking!

[Saturnine (Jeff)]

Damn fine effort Dave, will look forward to seeing how it turns out with more data, the O111 shell should be quite pretty, for lack of a better term.
The image does look quite smooth, nice colours too but a touch of coma in the corners, which in the grand scheme of things is just nitpicking.

[Nikolas (Nik)]

Decent effort in bortle 7 skies mate imagine what you could pull out with 20 hours integration

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Looking good Dave, I always love that cone shaped bit of nebulosity, just to the left of the central star, always imparts a bit of a 3D look

Mike

[Startrek (Martin)]

Dave,
That’s a great first light image of a challenging object under B7 full moon with your big scope
Beautifully processed too
That L Ultimate is a winner !
Well done !!
With these latest crop of OSC dual band filters ( mine being the Antlia ALPT 5nm ) you really need loads of data on emission nebula under Sydney’s LP, not to mention the moon blasting down at your scope. It’s not always possible but it does make a huge difference with SNR and exposure of fine detail and colour. That Bayer matrix on the OSC is our nemesis compared to Mono

Cheers
Martin

[Dave882 (David)]

Thanks guys yeah I’m pleased with how the L-Ultimate performed but the data (especially the second night with the moon so close) probably was still affected by the glare and in future would plan for a target some distance away.

Jeff- There was indeed what appeared to be some tilt on one side of the image. It showed up in flat calibrations as a deep red shift in the image and the resulting star shapes elongated. It only affected about 10% of the frame but enough to be seen so just something I’ve got to work out for next time I guess. Just weird I’ve never seen this come up like this before so maybe somethings shifted. Astrophotography ay!

[TrevorW]

Better than mine but I still need to collect more data

[gregbradley]

That's a very good image. I like the image scale you got here as this is a small object.

Good detail too.

Greg.

[matlud (Mathew)]

Nice work Dave! Very interesting to see it by itself front and centre rather than tucked down the bottom of the frame in a wider shot.
Cheers, Mat

[Dave882 (David)]

Thanks gents much appreciated! I’m at about 22hrs into it now so a couple of weeks and hopefully I’ll get to the 30hr mark for a repro. I know there’s plenty more detail in those shells to reveal. I’ll keep y’all posted!