This is a portrait of the main nebulosity in Orion around the Belt and Sword, including: the Orion Nebula itself (at bottom), aka Messiers 42 and 43; the Running Man Nebula above (aka NGC 1973-5-7); the dark Horsehead Nebula (B33) silhouetted in front of the bright nebula IC 434; the Flame Nebula (NGC 2024) above Alnitak; and at top left the reflection nebulas Messier 78 and NGC 2071. However, the entire field is filled with streamers and patches of emission and reflection nebulas. The three stars of the Belt of Orion are at centre, from L to R: Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka. The large loose open star cluster Collinder 70 surrounds the centre star of the belt, Alnilam. The bright blue star cluster NGC 1981 shines above the Running Man. The field of view is almost 9° by 6°. This is a stack of just 11 x 4-minute exposures with an Askar FMA230 astrograph (230mm focal length at f/4.5), and stock Canon R6 camera at ISO 800. The camera was not modified and no filters were employed here. The field could have used more exposures but clouds and altitude prevented that! Some light haze on some frames added star glows. I did not take short exposures for the core of the bright Orion Nebula. Nebulosity is brought out in Photoshop using successive curves with luminosity masks generated by Lumenzia, and with applications of the Nebula Filter action from the PhotoKemi StarTools action set, and Enhance DSO from the Astronomy Tools action set. All alignment and layering was in Photoshop. Taken from home January 25, 2022. Autoguided and dithered with the MGEN3 guider, with LENR dark frame subtraction also applied to each frame in camera to eliminate the edge amp glow the R6 exhibits. It was about -5° C this night.
NGC 281, the Pacman Nebula, in Cassiopeia, taken from home November 21, 2016, as part of testing of the Explore Scientific FCD100 102mm apo refractor. This is a stack of 5 x 6-minute exposures at f/7 with the ES field flattener, and filter-modified Canon 5D MkII at ISO 1600. The bright star is Alpha Cassiopeiae, aka Schedir. North is to the left here, to produce a nice composition in portrait mode and with the “pacman” figure more obvious.
The Lambda Centauri complex, also known as the Running Chicken Nebula IC 2948 (at left) and above it the Pearl Cluster (NGC 3766). Just right of centre is the open cluster IC 2714 ad below it the small barely resolve cluster Mel 105. To the upper right is the nebula complex NGC 3576/81. This is a rich area of sky to explore with binoculars or a low-power telescope with exccellent contrasts between rich starfields and dark nebulas. This is a stack of 4 x 10 minute exposures at f/4.3 with the Borg 77mm astrograph (330mm focal length) and Canon 5D MkII at ISO 800. Taken from Coonabarabran, Australia, March 2014.
