Starship Asterisk*

https://astrob.in/i5ho0d/0/
https://astrob.in/i5ho0d/0/rawthumb/reg ... g?insecure
Seagull Nebula (IC 2177) and Thor’s Helmet (NGC 2359)

The Seagull Nebula consists of IC 2177 (the wings), a region of nebulosity and NGC 2327 (the head), some 3.650 light-years away between the constellations Monoceros and Canis Major.

NGC 2359 (also known as Thor's Helmet) is an emission nebula in the constellation Canis Major.
The nebula is approximately 11.960 Ly away and 30 light-years in size. The central star is the Wolf-Rayet star WR7.

🗓 January, 12th. 2023
Giruá, RS, Brazil. Bortle 4.
ASKAR FRA300 refractor
asi6200mc, Mount: ZWO AM5.
🕶 IDAS NBZ filter
- 55 x 300s (4,58h)
pixinsight, photoshop

I took my first thermal lunar image at the beginning of 2023. I continue capturing the photos daily as long as I can see the Moon.
This is the final result. I cannot continue the series because the Moon becomes too low and too close to the sun.
The equipment is my DIY 12" F3 Newtonian and a thermal camera. The camera is sensitive to 8-14um LWIR.
Because the wavelength is so long, the resolving power of this setup is only as good as a small optical binocular.
The false color animation demonstrates the heat distribution change on the lunar surface where the red area is the hottest part while the purple color is the coldest part.

The stories the colors and surface of the full Moon tell us

Photo description:
This composite photo is of the full moons I have captured in nearly 7 years. Because Mare Crisium is located on the east side of the moon, its position can tell the position of the moon in the sky. Therefore, the moon in the picture is arranged according to the position of Mare Crisium (or the position of the moon in the sky). Mare Crisium above the lunar surface indicates when the full moon rises in the east. As the moon rises, the position of Mare Crisium shifts to the right. When Mare Crisium is on the right side of the lunar surface, that is, when the full moon is near the zenith, it is also around midnight. At this time the sky is the darkest, and if the weather is clear, you can see the clearest iron-gray lunar surface. Then the moon slowly set, and Mare Crisium turned to the lower right. A full moon usually sets around sunrise. The color of the dawn is usually gray-blue or pink-gray, and the color of the full moon will also be close to the color of the sky, and the surface of the moon is relatively unclear.
The various colors of the lunar surface in the picture can tell us about the relationship between the color of the moon and the atmosphere. During moonrise and moonset, the low-altitude moon will appear yellow or red due to atmospheric scattering. A contrasting iron-gray Moon indicates clear skies, and the Moon is usually near the zenith at this time. When the full moon sinks around sunrise, it will appear a gray-blue or pink-gray color close to the dawn sky.
In addition to the position of the Mare Crisium and the color of the moon, because the photos are all taken at the same focal length, it can be seen that the size of the moon also changes significantly, which is related to the distance between the moon and the earth.
In addition, in the nearly 7 years of shooting the moon, in 2022, I encountered a bronze-colored super-beautiful total lunar eclipse, and it is even rarer to capture the once-in-a-thousand-year total lunar eclipse occulting Uranus. Of course there have also been total lunar eclipses about to set that are barely discernible to the naked eye. Fortunately, I also encountered a plane that happened to fly by. In fact, the shooting is more about the moon in the cloud. All the fun goes without saying.

Equipment Details:
Canon EOS 600D + SIGMA 60-600mm F4.5-6.3 S DG OS HSM Sports
Canon R7 + SIGMA 60-600mm F4.5-6.3 S DG OS HSM Sports
Post-processing Details:
37 Full moon photos put together using Powerpoint
Location : Taipei, Taiwan
Time: April 22, 2016 to January 6, 2023
Photographer : Meiying Lee (李美英) 　

Orion's Nebulae by Ray Bellis, on Flickr



What's notable for me about this image is how easy it was to produce. I recently bought a Vaonis Verspera observation station, a fantastic little all-in-one imaging platform, that sits about 2' high and involves no cable juggling or all of the other hassles associated with trying to manage the various pieces of equipment that make up the usual imaging rig. I take it outside to our garden patio when it's dark and just make sure it's levelled.
Once powered up, I just fire up the companion mobile app, connect to the scope's built-in Wi-Fi access point and tell it to initialise. It opens up, goes through a star search (via plate solving), an autofocus process, and within 2 or 3 minutes it's ready to start imaging.

The attached photo uses the device's built-in mosaic feature to extend it's field of view from a 2 megapixel 1.6º x 0.9º view up to an 8MP 5º x 1º panorama. The scope stacks as it goes, and I exported a 16-bit TIFF once the 1st pass of the mosaic was complete. I did let it run for a second pass but some clouds came in so that never completed.

After that, about 15 to 20 minutes work in PixInsight produced what you see here (steps in the image description on Flickr).

a detail I forgot - the image is made of 10 second sub frames, with the integrated camera's gain set to its default of 20dB. It was taken Wednesday night (Jan 18th) from my garden in Oxfordshire UK under Bortle 4/5 skies.

Happy Lunar New Year
2023 is the Year of the Rabbit in China. According to Chinese legend, the surface of the moon likes a big rabbit. Happy lunar new year to all.
This composite photo is of the full moons I have captured in nearly 7 years. The top rows of the picture are the moons as it rose eastward in the first half of the night. In the middle is the moons at the zenith around midnight. The lower rows are the moons as it sets around sunrise. The various colors of the lunar surface in the picture can tell us about the relationship between the colors of the moon and the atmosphere.

Equipment Details:
Canon EOS 600D + SIGMA 60-600mm F4.5-6.3 S DG OS HSM Sports
Canon R7 + SIGMA 60-600mm F4.5-6.3 S DG OS HSM Sports
Post-processing Details:
61 Full moon photos put together using Powerpoint
Location : Taipei, Taiwan
Time: April 22, 2016 to January 6, 2023
Photographer : Meiying Lee (李美英) 　

https://astrob.in/men1p3/B/rawthumb/reg ... g?insecure

Molecular Clouds in Chamaeleon

This framing shows an area of star formation (one of the closest we have from earth, only 500ly) in the constellation of Chamaeleon.
The brightest nebula (blue nebula up in the frame) is IC2631, a reflection nebula.
The blue nebula below is Ced111 while the beautiful C-shaped yellowish nebula close to it is Ced110.

This is a 9h integration photograpeh in 2 nights (16th and 19th, January, 2023).

🗓 January, 19th. 2023
Giruá, RS, Brazil. Bortle 4.
FotonAstro Astropipe 200MM F4 Newtonian Astrograph
asi2600mc
🕹 ZWO AM5.
🕶 No filters (UV/IR built in)
- 221 x 150s (9,2h)
pixinsight, photoshop

NGC 1491 (Fossil Footprint)
Click on above to enlarge.

Full info and higher resolution @ https://www.kinchastro.com/ngc-1491-fos ... -2023.html

Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF

C/2022 E3 ZTF - January 21st 2023 by Alessandro Carrozzi, su Flickr

Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) associated with an Airlgow... (France)
flickr (full hd) : https://www.flickr.com/photos/julienlooten/52642153664
Copyright: Looten julien

Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) associated with an Airlgow... (France) by Julien Looten, sur Flickr

Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) associated with an Airlgow...

Here is an image taken this Sunday around 1am, at the foot of the cliff of Les Eyzies (Dordogne). You may have heard that a comet was approaching us this month... I set myself the goal of taking a picture of it by associating it with a landscape/monument.

Identified in March 2022, this comet (visible in the centre of the image) is a small celestial body of about 1km in diameter composed mainly of ice. These days, it is becoming visible to the naked eye (in optimal viewing conditions). Aim for the north, near the Big and Little Dipper.

To make this image, I had to face several problems... the first one was to wait for a clear sky (rather rare at the moment). Secondly, I had to choose a good location (towards the north). I chose the village of Les Eyzies (Dordogne) despite its high light pollution.

This village is considered as the cradle of world prehistory. It is home to dozens of decorated caves, and the oldest human fossils (Neanderthals) discovered in France and Europe. Our ancestors lived there tens of thousands of years ago... Perhaps they were lucky enough to see this comet pass by, having already encountered our solar system 50,000 years ago...

The comet is still "faint" in brightness (unlike the Neowise comet), and was very low on the horizon... Another difficulty was to manage the strong light pollution generated by the village of Les Eyzies, which on long exposures, generates a halo of light on the whole photograph...

For this, I took a series of images (15) of the sky with relatively short exposures (13 seconds) with low iso to avoid saturating the image. Then, to counterbalance the light pollution, I did an HDR (different exposures).

The sky seems to be covered with "multicoloured clouds"... This is not a question of spurious colours or special treatments. It is a rare natural phenomenon caused by a chemical reaction in the upper atmosphere, where the sun's rays excite molecules which then emit a very weak light (chemiluminescence) of green and/or orange colour. This is called airglow. I had the chance that evening to observe an important airglow.... even visible to the naked eye...

Canon 6d Astrodon
Sigma f1.4
5 mn of exposure
01/22/23 - 1h
Eyzies (France, Dordogne).

Thanks in advance

Hello,
Here is the spaghetti nebula SH2-240 in HOO, made with 6D canon defiltered and Idas NBZ dual band filter
Nebula which is very dimly lit so it will have taken about 26 hours of exposures spread over 1 month, in 5 nights, I wanted to double the exposure time but in view of the weather and the time it would still take, I prefer m stop there and move on to new things.
I'm still very happy with the result knowing that I'm doing this on the go and without computer help to image everything is artisanal in the shooting.
Thanks again to my friend Philippe Bernhard who again helped me greatly with the treatment.
Full version https://astrob.in/imfvu9/0
Redcat51 imager with a defiltered Canon 6d
HEQ5 pro goto mount
Guide Lacerta mgem 3
IDAS NBZ filter 2''
About 26 hours of cumulative exposures
Good sky!


https://astrob.in/imfvu9/0/rawthumb/hd/get.jpg?insecure

The Mystic Mountain - Herbig Haro 901 & 902

This picture features the incredible beautiful "Herbig-Haro 901 & 902" object.

Image acquisition information:
Data credit: Aygen Erkaslan / Chilescope
Date: 01/18/2023, 01/19/2023 / 01/21/2023
Location: El Sauce, Chile
Scope: RC-1000 (F/6.8)
Camera: FLI PRO 16803
Sii, Ha, Oiii, respectivelyt 600s (#14, #18, #14), 600
Intégration time : 7.4h




Link to full size image : https://www.astrobin.com/full/qn94zj/I/

Not sure if this is the first amateur thermal image of the International Space Station.
I am so excited to capture the heat of ISS more than 530km away.

Shark attack on the observatory by Wael Omar, on Flickr

"Shark attack on the observatory"
This is the hardest object I 've ever captured till now , Its a real challenge for anyone love astrophotography .
The Shark nebula is a very faint cloud of interstellar dust in the constellation of Cepheus , its far from earth by 650 light years with a length of 15 light years.
The two blue reflection nebula are shining from the hot stars nearby.
The apparent size of the shark nebula is as big as 10 times Full moon apparent size in the sky.
The sky and foreground are taken in same place , For the scale to be fit I shot the sky image by ZWO 294 mm pro with redcat and the
foreground with the A7 III with 300 mm lens so the FOV is nearly close to each other .

Sky image was on 3 nights at Bortle 5 area and I enhanced the L channel by some data I took in Bortle 2 area . The foreground was away from the "Qatamyah" observatory by 6 km in very remote area away from everything, It was so scary night and I heard different night animals sounds during the session , I was so scared that I even thought it was Alien sounds , I couldn't expect more as i was capturing a sea monster in the sky.

Equipment used :
ASI 294 mm pro camera
Redcat 51 scope
HEQ5 pro mount
Foreground is captured by Sony A7 III with 300 canon lens.
Exposure times, ISO settings:
Astronomik Deep-Sky Blue 2": 21×300″(1h 45′) (gain: 121.00) -10°C bin 1×1
Astronomik Deep-Sky Green 2": 27×300″(2h 15′) (gain: 108.00) bin 1×1
Astronomik Deep-Sky Red 2": 22×300″(1h 50′) (gain: 108.00) bin 1×1
Optolong L-Pro 2": 145×300″(12h 5′) (gain: 108.00) -10°C bin 1×1
Optolong L-Pro 2": 34×300″(2h 50′) (gain: 120.00) -10°C bin 2×2

Total integration time : 20 hrs 45 minutes
For technical Data:
https://www.astrobin.com/c46ddf/?utm_source=astrobin...
Credit : Wael Omar WO / https://www.instagram.com/waelomar_astrophotography/

"THE GREAT ORION NEBULA"
- Deep Sky 750mm LRGBhA
- Constellation Orionis



The Orion Nebula (M42 or NGC 1976) is an emission nebula in the constellation of Orion. Due to the high apparent brightness of its center above the 4th magnitude, the nebula is clearly visible to the naked eye as part of Orion's Sword south of the three stars of Orion's Belt. Overall, it has an angular extension of about one degree.
The Orion Nebula is a subregion of the interstellar molecular cloud OMC-1 in the Orion molecular cloud complex. It consists mainly of hydrogen. Stars form in the nebula, whose ionizing radiation makes the nebula shine in the visible range. It is therefore also classified as an H-II area. At a distance of about 1350 light-years, it is one of the most active star-forming regions in the galactic neighborhood, which is why it is a preferred study object for studying star formation. It is expected to evolve into a Pleiades-like open star cluster.
The main ionization source of the Orion Nebula is the star θ¹ Orionis C1, which is also one of the most luminous stars known with more than 200,000 times the luminosity of the Sun. However, the immediately adjacent and similarly configured De Mairan's Nebula has a different ionizing source and is therefore not part of the Orion Nebula.

| Object : M42 The Great Orion Nebula
| Stack RGB : 288 Lights R+G+B / 100 Darks / 25 Flats / 500 Bias
| Stack LUM : 576 Lights Luminance / 100 Darks / 25 Flats / 500 Bias
| EBV Tools : Pixinsight / Adobe PS&LR / GraXpert / AstraImage
| Pixinsight: Blur X, Noise X, Star X Terminator, HDR Compilation
| Guiding : PHD2 & ZWO-ASI120 Mono / N.I.N.A.
| M&O : AZ-EQ6 GT Pro / Skywatcher 150/750 PDS
| Filter : Astronomy L/R/G/B
| Stuff : iKK GPU / OCTO+ 2"/ bezel ring / Lacerta MFOK
| Camera : Atik 16200 Mono & Filra / BW 750mm
| Exif RGB1 : BLZ each 64x 5s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Exif RGB2 : BLZ each 64x 60s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Exif RGB3 : BLZ 16x 180s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Exif LUM1 : BLZ 256x 2s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Exif LUM2 : BLZ 64x 5s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Exif LUM3 : BLZ 256x 60s per frame / UnityGain / f/5
| Total BLZ: 11 hours 11 minutes 52 seconds

Conditions for recordings:
Clear nights, taken directly from the small town at Bortle 7 sky, clear light pollution from city lights.

Best regards,
Thomas ArtOfPix Großschmidt

Tadpoles
Copyright: Robert Leach
https://www.flickr.com/photos/dovber90/ ... ed-public/

Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) and NGC 5907 by Harley Grady, on Flickr

Here's my second attempt at shooting C/2022 E3 (ZTF). This time I was able to capture the "Green Comet" as it passed by NGC5907 seen in the lower center of the frame. NGC5907 is a "knife edge" galaxy (due to its orientation to use) and is approximately 50 Million Light Years from Earth!

This photo is a combination of 28x300" exposures. I used my TS Optics 90mm CF APO refractor telescope with a .8x reducer (430mm focal length.) The camera I used was my ASI 2600MC Pro. For processing I used Pixinsight and processed the star/galaxy image separate from the comet itself.

Thanks for looking!

@nebulositymedia2023

I just finished processing #comet #E3ZTF. It has developed a rare #antitail which is pretty cool. 2 hours of 5min subs using skywatcher and 2600mcpro over AM5 mount from Death Valley CA.

Ken Walker
Messier 78 in the constellation of Orion
Approximately 1350 light years from earth
Sky quality seeing below average
Stellarvue SVX130T Raptor
MallinCam DS26m TEK
Chroma 36mm LRGB
SG-Pro
Paramount MYT
PixInsight
Link below

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kwalker50 ... ed-public/

The Shark before attack!

Hi, attached large field capture of LDN 1235, LDN 1251 and VdB 152, which in the frame looks like LDN 1234 (Shark Nebula), preparing to attack LDN 1251.

Samyang 135mm
ZWO ASI2600MC Pro
iOptron GEM28
Exposure: 4h 40'

Venus and Saturn conjunction with Moon

Venus and Saturn conjunction with Moon by Tom Glenn, on Flickr

This image shows the conjunction of Venus and Saturn above the young crescent Moon (2% illuminated). The angular separation between the two planets is less than the apparent diameter of the Moon, which can be appreciated in the photograph. Despite their apparent close proximity, the distance to Venus (magnitude -3.9) was 230 million km, and the distance to Saturn (magnitude 0.87) was 1.6 billion km. For comparison, the distance to the Moon was 358k km. The horizontal clouds are the result of contrails from jets flying along the CA coast. I captured this single 2s exposure last Sunday evening, January 22, 2023, at 6pm local time (PST) from San Diego, CA.

Nikon D500
Nikon 70-200mm lens at 105mm, f/5.6, ISO 400, 2s

Moon, Venus, and Saturn
Moon, Venus, and Saturn by li_chang, on Flickr

Here is the photo I took on 2023/01/22 at Rancho Cordova, CA, United States. The subject is Moon at Waxing Crescent phase (around 2%). It is hardly visible until sunset, and there are also Venus and Saturn right above the moon. Foreground is the silhouette of a local electrical substation.

Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF
UT 2023-01-22 11:55 from central Colorado. QSI660 camera on RC10 scope.
23x30s lum, 21x60s red, 21x60s green, 20x60s blue.
Processed in PixInsight and Photoshop.
_

Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF (with anti-tail) passes by the Knife Edge Galaxy (NGC 5907)
Another nice comet to image! Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) even has a third tail known as an anti-tail. This anti-tail seems pointing toward the sun, but it's an optical illusion that can appear as Earth crosses the plane of the comet’s orbit when the body is close to the Sun. When viewed from a certain angle from earth, the dust behind the comet can look like it's pointing towards the sun.

This photo is a two panel mosaic captured with my c9.25 SCT and Hyperstar with an ASI533mc Pro camera, mounted on an EQ6-R Pro
Certainly another unforgettable comet!
43x30s at 100 gain
Processed with Pixinsight and Photoshop

Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF @ Ancona by Andrea Amici - Andrystix

Comet C/2022 E3 @ Ancona on 23th January 2023 (9PM-11PM)

Here is my version of the "Neanthertal Comet" (technically C/2022 E3 ZTF). I must say that contrary to forecasts, the Comet is very faint and absolutely not visible to the naked eye... let's say that finding it gave me more satisfaction than photographing it. Surely the fact of being in the center with maximum light pollution didn't help me, but since these days around 9 pm it is still low in the sky, I tried to place it in a landscape context, obviously with my beloved Ancona. The photo is the result of 3 single shots (taken with a 200mm telephoto lens) side by side horizontally to create the classic vertical panorama effect. To process the comet instead I made about 240 shots of 10 seconds each, capturing about 40min of signal. To process it I used 2 software, with manual alignment of each single pose. By doing this I enhanced the classic emerald green color and the gas trails (although not very visible). Fortunately (or unfortunately given the weather these days) while I was photographing the middle part of the sky to carry out the merger, I managed to capture a beautiful bolt of lightning that was particularly slow in real life and lit up the whole sea behind the Duomo.

TECHNICAL DATA

Nikon D750 Astro modified, with AFS NIKKOR 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VR II

3 shots merged panorama with Photoshop:

City = Single 10 sec, ISO 100, f/9
Lightning = Single 10 sec, ISO 635, f/7.1
Sky = Single 10 sec, ISO 635, f/2.8
Comet = 241 x 10 sec, ISO 635, f/2.8 manually processed with DSS and Sequator