Cygnus Wall in NGC7000

Cygnus Wall in NGC7000

January 7, 2025
Uncategorized
Science lesson! My kids took an online astronomy class about a year ago. As part of the class, they used a remote telescope service called Slooh. Slooh is a fantastic intro to deep sky astronomy for kids. It lets you pick targets then a telescope takes an image and sends it to you. That was great fo…
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Elephant’s Trunk Nebula – LDN1105

Elephant’s Trunk Nebula – LDN1105

January 4, 2025
Nebula
This was another side-quest project while waiting for a much bigger project's target to rise. The Elephant's Trunk Nebula is a star-forming area and emission nebula that's part of a much larger area named IC1396. It hangs out about 2400 light years away in the same chunk of sky as the constellation …
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Crescent Nebula – NGC6888

Crescent Nebula – NGC6888

December 1, 2024
Nebula
Honestly, this started out as another "filler" project. I was looking ahead to winter projects and wanted to get fairly deep looks at several targets I hadn't shot before. A little over a month ago when I started this, those targets didn't get high enough in the sky to start imaging until several ho…
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Soul Nebula – IC1848

Soul Nebula – IC1848

November 24, 2024
Nebula
The Soul Nebula is very near my last project, the Heart Nebula, and is also an emission nebula in the Cassiopeia constellation. I captured over 56 hours of data for this image between October 17th and 23rd, 2024. I think this is another "my biggest project to date." I used Siril’s OSC_Extract_HaOIII…
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Heart Nebula – IC1805

Heart Nebula – IC1805

November 10, 2024
Nebula
The Heart Nebula is an emission nebula in the Cassiopeia constellation. The light from this left the Heart Nebula 7,500 years ago and thankfully found its way to my telescope. It's massive at 165 light years across. Between Oct 9 and Oct 16, 2024, I captured almost 43 hours of data for this image. I…
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Pacman Nebula – NGC281

Pacman Nebula – NGC281

October 24, 2024
Nebula
The Pacman Nebula is another new target for me. It's an emission nebula in the Cassiopeia constellation. It's about 9500 light years away and 48 light years across. Between Sep 9 and Oct 8th, I captured 35 hours of data. I used Siril’s OSC_Extract_HaOIII script and a 60/40 Ha/OIII split on the green…
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Sh2-54, Sharpless 54

Sh2-54, Sharpless 54

October 20, 2024
Nebula
This is Sh2-54, an emission nebula region in the Serpens constellation. It's about 6200 light years away and 126 light years across. I've imaged the Eagle Nebula and Omega Nebula near this, but I haven't imaged Sh2-54 before. I decided to shoot it late in its season, so I was only able to get a few …
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Messier 27, the Dumbbell Nebula

Messier 27, the Dumbbell Nebula

October 20, 2024
Nebula
In between other projects over the last three months, I snuck in exposures of M27. I started the project by just shooting a few test frames when I needed an easy target. That evolved into a little side quest to get enough data for a decent image. Most nights, I imaged M27 after one target had set wh…
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NGC7822, Sharpless 2-171

NGC7822, Sharpless 2-171

September 11, 2024
Nebula
My longest project to date at 38.5 hours of imaging, this is NGC7822. NGC7822 is in the constellation Cepheus. It contains a large emission nebula, Sharpless 171, a star cluster Berkeley 59 and a young star forming region. The nebula is about 2900 light years away and about 75 light years across. I …
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G11 Gemini 1 Serial Port Repair

G11 Gemini 1 Serial Port Repair

August 20, 2024
Losmandy G11
Last week I was imaging for a new astrophotography project and my Losmandy G11 stopped responding correctly to NINA and PHD2. It was already midnight, but I spent a few more hours trying to solve the problem. Some commands worked intermittently, but it correctly executed commands so infrequently tha…
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