This wide-field image frames the prominent emission nebula IC 1396, at left, and the faint arcs of Sharpless 2-129 at right, in southern Cepheus. IC 1396 contains the dark Elephant Trunk Nebula at about the 3 o’clock position in the nebula. At the top edge of the nebula is the orange giant star Mu Cephei, aka Herschel’s Garnet Star. The dark nebula at top left is Barnard 169-70-71. The dark nebulas at the bottom of IC 1396 are B160, B162 and the snake-like B365. A small blue reflection nebula below and left of the Sharpless complex is VandenBurgh 140. This is a blend of filtered and unfiltered shots, all with the William Optics RedCat 51mm astrographic refractor at its native f/5 and with the Canon EOS Ra: 6 x 8-minutes at ISO 1600 without the filter and 4 x 12-minutes at ISO 5000 with the Optolong L-Enhance filter, which reduces light by about 2 to 3 f-stops but really makes the H-alpha nebulas stand out. All stacked, aligned and blended in Photoshop. LENR employed on all frames on this warm summer night to ensure the most accurate dark frame subtraction of thermal noise but at the cost of doubling the capture time.
Nebulosity in Cepheus with 135mm telephoto lens at f/2.8 and Canon 5DMkII at ISO 640 for stack of 4 x 4.5 minutes. IC 1396 is large nebula right of centre; Sharpless 2-129 is crescent shaped nebula at right of frame; NGC 7380 is at left of frame; Sh 2-132 is between IC 1396 and NGC 7380; prominent dark nebulas are B 169-70-71 (large one) and B 173-4 (smaller one).
Heart and Soul Nebula area of Cassiopeia. IC 1805 (Heart Nebula) at right with NGC 896 at upper right, and IC 1848 (Soul Nebula, aka the Foetus Nebula) at left with NGC 1027 open cluster between them. This was taken October 13, 2010 from home with the Borg 77mm astrograph at f/4.1 and the Canon 5D MkII camera (filter modified) at ISO 800 for a stack of 5 x 15 minute exposures with IDAS Light Pollution Supression filter. It was autoguided with the SBIG SG-4 stand-alone Smart Guider, which does a superb job. This was the first real test of the LPS filter, which slides into a filter drawer the little Borg astrograph has. The LPS filter cuts out unwanted wavelengths and lets through emission lines from nebulas such as this, while remaining fairly colour-neutral. It certainly does help bring out the faint nebulosity while increasing contrast and darkening the sky. However, compared to an unfiltered image, this view does sacrifice some of the subtle colour variations (magentas, oranges) visible in nebulas such as this, plus you lose some of the subtle variations in colours in the background sky from dark nebulosity which can contribute shades of yellow, brown, even green. The result with the filter is more "in-your-face" red everywhere. Impressive, but lacking some of the fine colours that DSLRs can record (as opposed to CCDs used with selective narrow-band filters).
