LBN 241 & NGC6910 mosaic in Cygnus

[pietervdv]

Hello everyone,

Taking advantage of a nice stretch of clear nights the past 2 weeks, I managed to make another mosaic.

This was the second mosaic I had on my "Cygnus bucket list" for 2015. I never thought the data acquisition would come together so quick.

Probably a lesser known part next to the ic1318 complex, LBN241 with the embedded starcluster NGC6910.

The whole area is very attractive in h-alpha  and it is tempting to keep mosaicing in all directions .

The view is made up from 3 vertical panels, clocking in at 19 hours total exposure time. Captured over 6 (white) nights.

Capture and autofocus was automated with Sequence Generator Pro while I was sleeping.

I tried to keep the post-processing to an absolute minimum (+/- 30 min).

No sharpening, no noise reduction or fancy PI tricks, PS was used for stretching and contrast boost + mosaic assembly.

Tech stuff:

Scope: self built 10" f/3.8 astrograph with 3" Wynne corrector

Mount: Mesu 200 Sitech

CCD: sbig st8300 @-18°c with Astrodon 5nm h-alpha filter (20 minute subexposures)

Guiding: homemade OAG with Lodestar (5 s guide intervals)

Small: http://www.astronomie.be/pieter.vandevelde/deepsky/LBN241_final_smal.jpg

Med: http://www.astronomie.be/pieter.vandevelde/deepsky/LBN241_final_med.jpg

The full size image is 22 Megapixels.

Thanks for taking a look, I hope you like it!

Pieter

[Epicycle]

Impressive mosaic!

The diffraction spikes are unusual (i.e. not continuous), are these naturally produced by the astrograph?

E.

[pietervdv]

Impressive mosaic!

The diffraction spikes are unusual (i.e. not continuous), are these naturally produced by the astrograph?

E.

Thanks!

The diffraction spikes will show intermittent as only the reds are captured.

But the additional "beads" in the diffraction spikes are indeed caused by the custom spider. These extra "pearls" only show up in h-alpha.

Pieter

[Epicycle]

Cool! Why do the pearls only appear in ha and not in other spectral lines like oiii?

E.

[pietervdv]

Not sure if they are present in the other narrowband channels; but I will soon find out since I have an O3 filter on order.

Pieter

[Epicycle]

I would expect them to be present too. Just took a look at your webpage, that astrograph is a real beauty!

E.

[Piero]

Impressive! All the dark 'filaments' are really intriguing! 

Congratulations for you work!

[toxic]

very nice

[ollypenrice]

Hi Pieter,

That's lovely. I like the minimalist processing. When the raw data is as good as that, why mess it about? 

Your scope really does deliver. To be honest it knocks seven bells (an old English expression) out of some professionally built instruments trying to do the same job. They should employ you to sort them out.

Olly