Category Archives: Nebulae

Elephant’s Trunk Nebula (IC 1396)

IC 1396 with the Elephant’s Trunk Nebula. 30×180 sec, QHY183c at -15C, Gain 11, Offset 50, Astro-Tech AT60ED at F/4.8, Optolong L-eNhance filter. Taken from a metro-area under heavy LP on Sep 26, 2021
Detail View – IC 1396 with the Elephant’s Trunk Nebula (IC 13996A.) 30×180 sec, QHY183c at -15C, Gain 11, Offset 50, Astro-Tech AT60ED at F/4.8, Optolong L-eNhance filter.

The Crescent Nebula on Sep 26, 2021

Crescent Nebula. 120 minutes (3 min subs,) QHY183c at -15C, Astro-Tech AT60ED at F/4.8, Optolong L-eNhance filter, SharpCap 3.2 LiveStacking from a metro area. Quick Fitsworks stretch, then final processing in PS.
Rotated, cropped and enhanced version of the Crescent Nebula. 120 minutes (3 min subs,) QHY183c at -15C, Astro-Tech AT60ED at F/4.8, Optolong L-eNhance filter, SharpCap 3.2 LiveStacking from a metro area. Quick Fitsworks stretch, then final processing in PS.

First Light – AT60ED

The Eagle Nebula – M16. 41×180 sec, QHY183C at Gain 20, Offset 0, -15C cooling, UHC filter, Astro-Tech AT60 ED at F/4.8.
The Trifid Nebula. 9×180 sec, QHY183C at Gain 20, Offset 0, -15C cooling, UHC filter, Astro-Tech AT60 ED at F/4.8.

First Light Images for a new Astro-Tech AT60ED telescope. Nice 360mm F/6 doublet with FPL-53 synthetic fluorite and Lanthanum lenses. I bought the 0.8x Reducer/Flattener that goes with it, too. It gives you a 288mm F.L. at F/4.8 with that combo. Resolution is still good at 1.72 arc sec/pixel with my camera.

These objects are the Eagle Nebula, Trifid and North America Nebulae.  All were taken with a QHY183C camera at gain 20, -15C cooling and a cheap no-name UHC filter from a metro area, Bortle 7-8 zone.

The North America Nebula. 9 x180 sec, QHY183C at Gain 20, Offset 0, -15C cooling, UHC filter, Astro-Tech AT60 ED at F/4.8.

M45, The Pleiades on Jan 14, 2021

M45 – 32×180 sec @ Gain 11, Offset 100, QHY183c at -20C, Baader UHC-S filter, Televue TV-85 at F/5.6.

Not too bad for a session from the metro LP zone!  Only 96 minutes, but it was enough with these settings to show quite a bit of nebulousity.  I used the unity gain setting (11) and that made a big difference in hot pixels and noise.   My other shots at a gain of 20 were plagued by hot pixels that SharpCap 3.2 doesn’t seem to be able to deal with very well.  I like this much better and there is just as much data buried in there as in the higher gain shots.