Eastern Veil Nebula

[pbyrne]

Hi all

While out on Tuesday night I decided to scan through Cygnus, specifically I was looking for the Veil with an 18mm Radian and O-III filter in the 12" dob. What I stumbled across was the Eastern Veil Nebula, man this is huge, the nebula must have gone through five or six fields of view and it is beautiful. The 18mm yields a magnification of x83, my lowest yield is a 27mm Panoptic, but this is a 2" EP and I don't have a 2" filter.

I would dearly love to sketch this object, but I think I would have to get something like a 41mm Panoptic and 2" O-III, this would give a mignification of x37 and reduce the amount of fields I would have to sketch.

Has anyone attempted to sketch it? If so what were your results?

[Talitha]

It looked lovely in my 80ST but understandably lacked the filamentary structure i've seen with my larger aperture scopes. In any case, it was magical to see the entire SNR in one fov.

[gliderpilot]

It is quite tricky to sketch isn't it? So much detail in the nebulosity and a myriad of background stars. I gave it a go and ended up making an artists impression than an accurate sketch. I guess you could do it over a period of sessions and make a montage.

The veil is one of my favourite objects, so much detail in such a spectacular star field.

Mark

[John]

Congratulations on finding the Veil !

It's my favourite summer DSO - I use a 31mm Nagler, Astronomik OIII filter and my F/6.5 102mm ED refractor to view it and I can fit the east (the Bridal Veil) and west (Witches Broom) segments in the same FoV. On really transparent nights the section known as Pickerings Triangular Wisp becomes faintly visable as well. It's a truly lovely sight

I've not attempted a drawing as yet though ......

[RikM]

Is an OIII essential for viewing the veil?

Rik

[John]

Is an OIII essential for viewing the veil?

Rik

I could not find it at all until I used a Baader UHC-S filter with a 4" refractor. Since then I've found an OIII enhances it even more. Once you have found it, you can remove the filter and it is just barely visable with a moderate aperture I've found - but an OIII makes it much, much more satisfying.

[Doc]

I would say it was essential. It looks fantastic with a 28 Uwan and a Baader O111 filter.

[panzanella]

When UHC and OIII filters are compared in reviews, the view of the Veil sounds much better with the OIII, but I don't really understand why. Is it the near H-beta portion of the broadband spectrum of nearby "white" stars acting as light pollution to the OIII wavelengths of the Veil? The extra bandwidth that the UHC passes is so small I'm surprised it has such a dramatic effect.

I have looked through neither filter and am undecided which to get first for a 10" reflector with moderate light pollution (probably Castell). The common advice seems to be UHC, but the Veil sounds fantastic so I'm erring towards OIII - seems to work for jahmanson. From Filter comparison

it looks like I'd miss out on Barnards' Loop, Horsehead, Gamma Cygni and Cocoon nebulae with this strategy, but the others I've heard of get quite close scores.

[Talitha]

Rik, without the filter there was understandably nothing seen in the 80ST. Regarding my other scopes though, a filterless view shows a 'brightening' of the background sky and the brightening increases with the aperture used, but no structural detail can be detected. But when the O-III is added to any of the scopes, the difference is absolutely amazing.

I should add that my one experience viewing the Veil with the 16" was very time limited and TBH, i only looked at the it for a few minutes before adding the O-III. I'd like to study it ASAP without the filter to see if any details can be pulled out. Hopefully Seymour will have some surprises for me.

[pbyrne]

In the Spetember issue of Astronomy Now Jeremy Perez shows how to sketch the entire Veil. He used an 8" Dob and 32mm Plossl with a magnification of 37.5. He also used an Orion Ultrablock filter.

It's a beautiful sketch.

[DarkerSky]

Thanks for the heads-up about September's Astro Now. I really want to see that sketch so getting myself a copy.

When I was on it in July with my 16" I could detect some faint wispyness to the north of 52 Cyg without an OIII, but it was difficult to make out any structure as such. The OIII view simply blew me away

[Llamanaut]

Following on from my other post about the veil I had a go last night at the veil with my 15x70's although viewing between the rain, clouds scudding across i did manage to see a rich star field which appeared to glow slightly (not sure if it was cloud or nebula though)

For Talitha, i was looking in the wrong place, i was slightly too far out to the side, cant wait for a clear night now to give it a real hard look at... Anyone know of any 'guides' to the veil nebula?

[Talitha]

For Talitha, i was looking in the wrong place, i was slightly too far out to the side, cant wait for a clear night now to give it a real hard look at... Anyone know of any 'guides' to the veil nebula?

I aim my red dot finder directly at 52 Cygni, the mag 4.2 star embedded within the Western Veil. If you can't see 52 naked eye, just guesstimate it's position by triangulating it with Epsilon (mag 2.5) and 41 Cygni (mag 4.0).

Or if you're using the refractor on the EQ mount, just get Epsilon in a wide fov ep, put in the O-III, and then slowly slide down the RA axis till you hit 52 Cygni... it's only one arc minute west of Epsilon, and a bit over three degrees south of it.