heart of the Heart Nebula (IC1805), Ha mono

[glowingturnip]

I had another go at a monochrome Ha presentation - I do like it, you can do a lot more with the tones and textures than you can get away with if it was coloured.  Mind you, I don't think I've managed to do a properly decent blend of Ha with LRGB yet...

What do you think of these ?

 

(looks like a snake about to strike, don't you think ?)

 

 

27x600s Ha, darks flats and bias, equipment as per sig, Pixinsight.

This tortured vortex of hot gas is a detail from the centre of the Heart Nebula (IC 1805), which lies some 7500 light years away from Earth and is located in the Perseus Arm of the Galaxy in the constellation Cassiopeia.  It is an emission nebula showing glowing ionized hydrogen gas and darker dust lanes.  This photograph is taken at the wavelength of the glowing hydrogen.  The nebula's intense red output and its configuration are driven by the radiation emanating from a small group of stars near the nebula's centre. This open cluster of stars known as Melotte 15 contains a few bright stars nearly 50 times the mass of our Sun, and many more dim stars that are only a fraction of our Sun's mass.

And just for fun, here's my first attempt at this target from a few years back (that's not nebulosity in the top corners, it's amp-glow):

 

Hope you enjoy !  Comments and cc welcome,

 

Cheers,

[Droogie 2001]

Lovely images, like the second one alot. 

[geoflewis]

6 minutes ago, Droogie 2001 said:

Lovely images, like the second one alot. 

+1 for the 2nd image. Also fun trying to match the star field in the 3rd image with the Ha images. I got there in the end - rotated ~180 deg

[glowingturnip]

Thanks both :-)

6 hours ago, geoflewis said:

Also fun trying to match the star field in the 3rd image with the Ha images. I got there in the end - rotated ~180 deg

Haha, I must admit I did exactly the same, but for anyone struggling, here, I've star-aligned it for you !

 

[simmo39]

V nice, v nice indeed!

[MikeODay]

Wonderful images Stuart; I particularly like the composition, tonal range and detail in the second and I also enjoyed reading the interesting details you noted down.

[glowingturnip]

17 hours ago, MikeODay said:

I particularly like the composition, tonal range and detail in the second

Thanks, yes I do like that one, was pleased I was able to get a good composition going on it, sometimes hard with the fixed viewpoint we have for astro photos.  Rule of thirds works a treat though ;-)

Couldn't resist presenting the close-up view of the first one as well though, I liked how there was so much detail in it, and the lighting (from the bottom two stars ?) gives it a 3D feel, even though the close-up does make the stars a little cludgy.