The Flying Bat and Squid Nebula

[Gerr]

The Giant Squid Nebula (Ou4) and Flying Bat Nebula (Sh2-129) is one of those targets where I thought it was not possible to do from my back garden in Wales!

I'm in a Bortle 4/5 location and the moon was 30% and 50% illuminated over the two nights of opportunity I had this whole month!

The target, by Cepheus, was conveniently quite far from the bright light in the sky and I had an L-eXtreme filter to boot!!

I manhandled the SW Evostar ED80 out of the shed and stuck it on a HEQ5 mount with a ZWO ASI294 MC Pro camera with 'that filter'.

Using APT, PHD guiding (Zwo120mm mini) and Cartes du Ciel (to put in the RA and Dec co-ordinates) the telescope slewed to the target and image acquisition began!!

Over the two nights I managed 9hrs of reasonable data (and lost 6hrs for various reasons).

This data (along with calibration frames) was put through Siril  to extract the H alpha and OIII images.

Photoshop (and Starnet) was then used to bring it all together. This task was really challenging due to the faint OIII data.

Nonetheless the result I eventually arrived at rather pleased me!

Yes, this target was possible from Wales!!

CC's welcome.

The Flying Bat and Squid Nebula:

 

 

 

 

 

[powerlord]

impressive amounts of oiii there in 'only' 9 hours. well done. And more innocent times when this was named the squid rather than the butt plug 😃

[JonHigh]

That truly is impressive. I have tried taking the Squid but never see it! I must be doing something wrong. May I ask what your setting were?

[ollypenrice]

Your OIII is way better than mine, which had 11 hours at an exceptionally dark site. I was using a mono CCD (Atik 11000) and Baader OIII filter. This was a decade ago and I think we can say that the technology has improved!

Great stuff.

Olly

[Gerr]

On 01/11/2023 at 08:51, ollypenrice said:

Your OIII is way better than mine, which had 11 hours at an exceptionally dark site. I was using a mono CCD (Atik 11000) and Baader OIII filter. This was a decade ago and I think we can say that the technology has improved!

Great stuff.

Olly

Thanks Olly,

OIII extraction with Siri provided a good start but still faint outline that was challenging to bring out in Photoshop! I noticed my star field overlay was inaccurate and I had to re-do the image again (included below). Glad no one noticed!!! 😂.👍

[Gerr]

On 31/10/2023 at 21:56, JonHigh said:

That truly is impressive. I have tried taking the Squid but never see it! I must be doing something wrong. May I ask what your setting were?

Zwo 294 at unity gain (cooled to -5 deg). 300 sec lights.  I acquired 9hrs worth for stacking and included darks (10 x 300secs), flats (12) and dark flats (12). Stacked in Siril, Ha and OIII script extraction. Saved as Tiffs and developed further in Photoshop. Channels replacement (Ha and OIII) and colour balance helped to produce and bring out the blue!!!

[ollypenrice]

13 minutes ago, Gerr said:

Thanks Olly,

OIII extraction with Siri provided a good start but still faint outline that was challenging to bring out in Photoshop! I noticed my star field overlay was inaccurate and I had to re-do the image again (included below). Glad no one noticed!!! 😂.👍

I've had that as well! Grrr.

Olly

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Richard_]

Very nice work! I'm also in a Bortle 5 area in Wales, so maybe I have a chance at this

 

[Gerr]

32 minutes ago, Richard_ said:

Very nice work! I'm also in a Bortle 5 area in Wales, so maybe I have a chance at this

 

It’s nice and high (not far from the Cygnus region). A large target too (I used a 600mm scope with 0.85 reducer) barely framed it with my equipment! 
Good luck and clear skies but it’s worth it!