Flaming Star nebula
After giving up on it a couple of weeks ago, I decided to have another try at the Flaming Star nebula, this time under better conditions…
Heading a few miles out of town to darker skies makes a huge difference for such a faint subject. The darker background not only make the nebula more visible, but also allows for longer exposure times before light pollution levels get too high. Because of this I was able to double the normal length of sub exposure to 1 minute, taking fifty in total.
To highlight the stars, a couple of extra minutes exposure using the was enough to bring out the colours in the line of stars beside the nebula.
Even with the extra light gathered, the final image stacked with Deep Sky Stacker took plenty of work in Photoshop to reveal the reds in the Flaming Star nebula and glowing cluster NGC 893 sitting opposite. Also revealed in the middle of the shot is the jewel-like Spider Nebula (IC 417) along with its prey, the tiny Fly Nebula (NGC 1931) seen just to the left. The two open clusters in the shot are M38 (top left) and M36 below.
Doubling or tripling the 50 minute exposure time would be necessary to improve the quality of the image. It looks a little grainy due to all the post-processing. But with the time I spent on processing, I think I’ll leave it at that!
Image details: Nikon D7000, Nikkor 180mm f2.8 at f2.8. 50 minutes (50 x 60 seconds) at iso 800 using didymium filter, plus 2 minutes (4 x 30 seconds) at iso 800 using . Stacked with Deep Sky Stacker and tracked with barn door tracker.
The wide angle shot below, taken at 35mm a few weeks ago, puts the 180mm shot in context…
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HI, amazing snaps using barn door tracker 😀
what’s the thickness of the wood you used for the tracker?
Thanks Nuvin 🙂 .. the two planks I used for the tracker were 22mm thick, 340mm long and 150mm wide.