The Flame & Horsehead HaLRGB

[groberts]

Over an eight week period from mid-January this year, very unusually I managed four images with total integration time of nealry 55-hours!  I appreciate that this is nothing to some but if you live in the UK close to Gatwick airport it's quite a feat, certainly unprecedented for me during the time I've been doing this astrophotography malarky! There are therefor more in the processing pipeline, which works very slowly here, but after Lowers Nebula posted here in March, the next one off the production line is the Horsehead Nebula.  

The dark silhouette of the Horsehead Nebula against the surrounding rich HII-region, is one of astronomy’s most iconic images.  Surprising then that I’ve never imaged this object in broadband wavelengths before with my mono camera: the first image was in February 2015 using a modded Canon 55OD camera, then in January 2018 with the ASI1600MM + narrowband filters and most recently in January 2021 using a widefield Samyang 135/f2 rig and modded Canon DSLR.  Therefore, somewhat belatedly and with the aforesaid long spells of clear skies, this February I set out to rectify this omission from my astrophotography repertoire and am pleased with the result - hope you like it?

Graham

Image Details: WO GT81 + ZWO ASI1600MM Cool camera

x35L x35R x34G x35B @120s exposure

x 78Ha @300s exposure

Total Integration: 11hr 8min