Cocoon widefield 2010

[ollypenrice]

Hi all,

This combines last year's wide Cocoon in the Tak FSQ at a focal length of 450mm with a closer-up image of the Cocoon itself in the TEC 140 from last week. I'm not sure how natural it looks (not very!) but I think getting the resolution is fun anyway.

A bit OTT? Probably.

Widefield, Atik 4000 mono, close up Atik 4000 OSC.

Olly

[Moonshane]

this is amazing - I love the dark (nebula?) trail off to the right, looks like exhaust as it flies left.

[moocher]

OTT? God no!!!!!

Alan

[ncjunk]

Looks great Olly, cocoon looks good I have seen quite a few where they have lost the faint blue around it...looks natural to me.

Brilliant framing btw.

[RobH]

Nothing at all unnatural about it Olly. The 2 sets of data have made a really great image

Cheers

Rob

[MartinB]

Nicely put together Olly. Looks very natural to me although, without going all philosophical, natural is an abstract concept when it comes to astro images!

[the rev]

Wow, that is most impressive.

Kate

[Trevor N]

Looks very good to me Olly. The dark lane draws your eye through the picture. Regards , Trevor

[cardconvict]

can you get these results from a dslr

[ollypenrice]

can you get these results from a dslr

Yes, or very nearly. Here's a link to my regular guest Frans Kroon's image of the Cocoon. It was taken with a Canon 20Da some years ago from the same site as my image. While the 20Da was a very expensive camera modded for astronomy by Canon themselves it is far less sensitive than a modern modded Canon. Frans now has a modded and cooled 40D which picks up far more Ha and has less noise so if he shot this now his result would be even better.

The difference in field of view arises simply from the telescope used. The widefield image in my picture was taken with a scope with half the focal length, roughly, of the Vixen Frans used for his.

The stars don't seem to come out as well in DSLR astro images as they do from CCD and in my view CCD is far easier - though that may be just being used to it. After resisting for quite a while Frans has ordered an 8300 chipped one shot colour CCD this year... He froze his 40D into a coma last summer but it came back to life in the morning!!

Deep Sky Astrophotography by Frans Kroon IC5146

Olly

[cardconvict]

yeah i see what you mean about the stars on your image compared to frans kroons image. thanks olly for replying great image by the way

[JonH]

What a beautiful image, a great inspiration to those of us just starting out.

[ollypenrice]

What a beautiful image, a great inspiration to those of us just starting out.

Thanks Jon - but the journey is one without end; I think we all feel we are beginners since there is so much to improve on and to learn. It's incredibly exciting, though, to have this kind of access to the depths of space. Have fun.

Olly

[russ]

Incredible stuff Olly...just the most amazing image!

[peter shah]

beautiful olly...perfectly framed