NGC 7380

[Hughsie]

Below is my rendition of the open star cluster discovered by Caroline Herschel, NGC 7380. It is also included in the Sharpless catalogue and is designated sh2-142. Most of my imaging over recent months has been concentrated in the region covering the constellations Cepheus and Cassiopeia in the North and NGC 7380 is located in the former.

Like a lot of nebulae, this has its own modern name, the Wizard Nebula, just in case sh2-142 doesn’t immediately roll off the tongue!

Narrowband data was captured in Hydrogen Alpha, Oxygen 3 and Sulphur 2 using 3nm 1.25” Chroma filters and the ZWO ASI1600 monochrome cooled camera. The three images representing these ionised gases were combined adopting the Hubble Palette and chucked into PixInsight. I will be revisiting this target again if the weather allows as the Sii was very faint and I feel there is more ‘red’ to bring out. Plus there is extended nebulosity coming from each side of the nebula that appears faint in this image.

From a processing perspective I did something I haven’t done before...I turned on the computer....no, seriously I removed all the stars from the colour image using the Starnet module and just concentrated on emphasising the nebulosity and colours without worrying about the stars. Once I was finished with the nebulosity, I added the stars back. As I said, I feel there should be more of a reddish colour to the lower part of the nebula and I have also ‘blown out’ a small bright region. So with more data I will return to this and see if I can bring out the colour and the more fainter regions but overall it was a useful experience processing in this way.

Equipment

• William Optics Z103 refractor.
• SkyWatcher EQ6-R Pro mount.
• ZWO ASI1600mm Pro Cooled camera.
• ZWO 8 position electronic filter wheel.
• Sesto Senso motor focuser.
• Pegasus Astro Power Box & climate sensor.
• William Optics 50mm Guidescope & ZWO ASI190mm mini guide camera.
• PHD2 used to control the guiding of the mount.
• Sequence Generator Pro used for acquisition.

 Data

• Hydrogen alpha 47 x 5 minutes
• Oxygen 3 48 x 5 minutes
• Sulphur 2 47 x 5 minutes
• Gain 139, offset 30

Thank you for dropping by.

John 

 

Edited September 26, 2020 by Hughsie
Synth lum added to original image & not resampled.

[peter shah]

beautiful colour and detail

[teoria_del_big_bang]

I have to agree with Peter, absolutely stunning detail and I just love the colours 🙂

Steve

[MarkAR]

Very nice.