Vern’s Weblog

Messier 20 (NGC 6514), known as Trifid Nebula in the constellation Sagittarius is favorite place for many of us to visit on summer evenings.  It is a fun object to photograph because the nice contrast between the blue reflection nebula and the red emission nebula. I created some wallpaper sized versions 1600×1200, 1280×1024, 1024×768, and 800×600.

Image taken early this morning around 2am from Louisville, CO with Celestron Nexstar11 telescope, Celestron F6.2 focal reducer, and Canon 300D Rebel camera. ImagePlus used to dark subtract, flat field and bias correct, align, stack, brightness and color enhance 10 images. Two minute exposures used at ASA 400. The sky was mostly clear, transparency varied from fair to good. Temperature was 64 to 62°F, no wind, turbulence was around 6/10.

Here is the sun in white light. I did h-alpha as well, but missed focus — out of practice I guess! Active region 10898 on the east limb (left) at 350 milli-hemispheres is the largest we’ve seen for a while.

Image of the sun was taken with 80mm refractor telescope, a Stellarvue A1010, Teleview 2.5X Powermate, and Canon 300D digital camera. Shutter at 1/250 sec at ASA 100. About 18 images aligned and stacked with Registax3, wavelet filtered, and color adjusted.

After imaging the little dumbbell nebula I couldn’t resist taking a look at the “real” dumbbell nebula, Messier 27, in constellation Vulpecula. Two triangular lobes can be seen in the northeast and southwest which give it its “dumbbell” appearance in smaller scopes. Observing in a larger scope or stretching the brightness a bit, reveals a more circular faint halo farther out. 

Image taken from Louisville, CO June 27, 2006 at 0:45 MDT with Celestron Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam II video camera. Camera settings: integrate 128, gain 9/14, medium gamma. Images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagePlus. Aligned and stacked 150 images with Registax3. Brightness enhanced with ImagePlus, cropped with Photoshop Elements. Sky was clear, temperature 55°F, 46% humidity, transparency very good, turbulence 6/10.

NGC 7026, in the constellation Cygnus, is a bright planetary with a darker central disk which gives the appearance of two brighter nodules. Hence its nicknames the “tiny dumbell” nebula or the “cheeseburger” nebula.

Image taken from Louisville, CO June 27, 2006 at 0:31 MDT with Celestron Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam II video camera. Camera settings: integrate 128, gain 9/14, medium gamma. Images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagePlus. Aligned and stacked 150 images with Registax3. Brightness enhanced with ImagePlus, cropped with Photoshop Elements. Sky was clear, temperature 55°F, 46% humidity, transparency very good, turbulence 6/10.

Globular cluster NGC 6760 in constellation Aquila has a Shapely class X density (on a Roman numeral scale of I to XII, I being the most dense).

Image taken from Louisville, CO June 27, 2006 at 0:14 MDT with Celestron Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam II video camera. Camera settings: integrate 128, gain 9/14, medium gamma. Images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagePlus. Aligned and stacked 150 images with Registax3. Brightness enhanced with ImagePlus, cropped with Photoshop Elements. Sky was clear, temperature 57°F, 45% humidity, transparency very good, turbulence 6/10.