Gamma Cygni Nebula - Barnard 344

[Avdhoeven]

Gamma Cygni Nebula - Barnard 344 by Andre vd Hoeven, on Flickr

Recently I attended a lecture from Jay Gabany at our national astrophotography meeting about intensifying colors in your images. I decided to work on one of my favorite images to see if I could get more out of it. Especially the star colors and delicate structures in the nebula I like a lot in this image.

Barnard 344 is a dark nebula in the constellation of Cygnus. It’s located close to the star Sadr in the Gamma Cygni Nebula (RA: 20h18m57.4s DEC: +40º 40′ 01″). Barnard 344 is located on the bottom of the image.

This region is very rich of dark and emission nebulae. On the image also VanDenBergh 130, a reflection nebula in this region, can be seen. It’s the circular cloudshape on the left center of the image. LBN234 is an emission nebula glowing with hydrogen and sulphur in the center of the image.

Barnard 344 was described by Barnard himself as: “Dusky spot, 7′ long; like an arrowhead, pointed SW; small star at NE end”.

This image is a combination of narrowband imagery with RGB images taken during a number of nights in July 2013.

Telescope: TEC-140

Camera: QSI-583

Mount: Skywatcher NEQ-6

H-alpha: 6 x 1800 s (3nm astrodon)

SII: 3 x 1800 s (3nm astrodon)

OIII: 4 x 1800 s (3nm astrodon)

RGB: (4,4,4) x 600 s (astrodon TrueRGB)

Total exposure time: 8.5 hours

[Cozzy]

Just one word, (stunning)

Tim

[pietervdv]

Very nice "american style" image! Indeed a great patch in Cygnus. The dark lanes leading into ic1318 (to the right of this field) are also very attractive.

I imaged the same area last year and will work on a mosaic around it when it comes up again.

Pieter

[swag72]

Very nice indeed. A real head turner

[toxic]

A very Special image indeed.

[Avdhoeven]

Thanks!

[Big Jim Slade]

Magnificent!

You've amped up the colour but retained the contrast and depth really well.