The Soul Nebula SHO - 113hrs

[Mr_42tr0nomy]

Greetings!

This was a 113hr collaboration with my friend, Trey Henderson. We totaled 50hrs of HA data (25 ea.), he collected 25hrs of Sii data, and I collected 28hrs of OIII data as well as 10hrs of RGB data for the stars (not presented in this image). As far as this image goes, I will be doing another rendition to show really show off the SHO (sulfur, hydrogen, oxygen) palette. This is also an SHO pallet but I really wanted to try the gold and blue look without the green... so I SCNR’D the greens out. The two looks are very different but awesome in their own way.. Anyway, I digress...
————
This nebula is the most detailed area of what’s better known as the Soul Nebula. I believe it lies nearly 6,500 light years away and is right underneath Cassiopeia. The one structure coming from the Ha and surprising the Sii channel give this nebula such a 3D feel. The spires on the right side of the nebula are nearly transparent! It’s so wild looking to me!
The orange colors here are ionized hydrogen and sulfur atoms. These atoms are being excited by the solar winds of the surround massive stars. The beautiful blue hues are ionized oxygen atoms.
————
This collaboration was a TON of work. Long nights of problem solving and trouble shooting connection problems, internal mount issues, data transferring issues (my fault bcs I don’t pay attention, lol), dew issues, scheduling issues, moon/running out of time issues... we barreled through nonetheless! I hope you guys enjoy!

Equipment:

at8rc/Edge8HD, asi1600, Cem60, Astrodon HA/Oiii/Sii 3nm. 

Clearest Skies!
Teagan

Edited November 14, 2019 by Mr_42tr0nomy

[alan potts]

Great image and an amazing amount of dedication required to pull it off, very well done both of you. I took a shot of this with my OSC and got the orientation completely wrong cutting it in half, must dig out the image and see I can match up any bits, a mere 2 hours.

Alan

[carastro]

Fabulous image, but how great to be able to get this number of hours on one target.  I think it would take me 2 years to get this much data in the UK.

Carole 

[Mr_42tr0nomy]

8 minutes ago, carastro said:

Fabulous image, but how great to be able to get this number of hours on one target.  I think it would take me 2 years to get this much data in the UK.

Carole 

Thank you! Yes we were very fortunate.

we averaged about 16hrs of day per imaging night with our two rigs. With that anything is possible! Shooting at f/8 has its downsides 

[Brian Maurer]

Did you shoot this from Ohio? I didn’t think they got 113 hours of clear skies in a year😁

 

its a fantastic image! What scope did you use?

[Mr_42tr0nomy]

1 hour ago, Brian Maurer said:

Did you shoot this from Ohio? I didn’t think they got 113 hours of clear skies in a year😁

 

its a fantastic image! What scope did you use?

 Nope! I’ve moved to pine Colorado about three years ago and the skies are much clearer here. I didn’t know that I didn’t include my equipment!

 

i used an 8rc and edge8hd and an asi1600 all on top of a cem60

[Brian Maurer]

Thanks, great image, now I have a goal to shoot for...pretty big goal.

[david_taurus83]

Great image and great dedication! Dont think we'd get that much clear sky time in a whole year here in the UK!

 

I'd be interested to know though, if theres much difference to the end quality of a target between say, 40 hours of data versus your 113 hours.

[Mr_42tr0nomy]

1 hour ago, david_taurus83 said:

Great image and great dedication! Dont think we'd get that much clear sky time in a whole year here in the UK!

 

I'd be interested to know though, if theres much difference to the end quality of a target between say, 40 hours of data versus your 113 hours.

Yes I know 113hrs is overkill haha but compared to other 40hr project I did, the snr was better in this image hands down. But I would see similar results yes