I’ve imaged the Rosette Nebula several times, but this is the first from the dark skies of Central Texas and with some better optics as well. I took a lighter touch on the processing this time, since the data was better – and it results in a smoother, more natural look than previous takes.
The Helix Nebula is also known as the Eye of Sauron or the Eye of God.
I wasn’t able to travel to the path of totality, but here from Florida we still had a partial eclipse. Here’s my shot at its peak, viewed through a special solar telescope using a Hydrogen-Alpha filter to bring out all the roiling detail of the sun’s surface. Check out those prominences around the edge!
It’s not the title of a children’s story – it’s a pair of galaxies 30 million light-years away that look like, well, a whale and a hockey stick. Officially their names are NGC 4631 and NGC 4656.
These past couple of nights, I revisited the Wizard Nebula – home of a star cluster about 7,000 light-years away within the constellation Cepheus. This is a false-color image in the “Hubble Palette” where red, green, and blue represent ionized Sulphur, Hydrogen, and Oxygen emissions respectively. Can you see the “wizard”? Hint: he’s lying on…
Lit up by the bright star Rigel in Orion, the “Witch Head Nebula” is a cloud of dust that reflect blue a little bit more. Unlike emission nebulas that emit their own light from ionized gases, this just reflects the light of Orion – although there *is* some ionized Hydrogen in the background, which you’ll…
An interesting emission nebula 30 light years across. Imaged with narrowband filters.
