Rosette Nebula.

The long winter nights have gone but some of those iconic targets are not forgotten, had a reprocess on this winters attempt of the Rosette Nebula. I think over the years my processing style has changed and improved, I like a more natural colour palette. Saying that I am looking at a full mono set up with LRGB HSO filters. Just 45 minutes worth of data here captured using the Optolong L-enhance filter in my ZWO filter draw.

 

The Horsehead Nebula

The winter months were not great from my location, that and the bloody tree facing due south, I only managed just over an hour on this iconic target, it beats too the image I took when featured on the Sky At Night Programme when Pete Lawrence visited our Society Breckland Astronmoical Society to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of Hubble. New image at top.  I know heavily cropped but an amazing difference in camera technology and processing technique.

M97 & M108 The Whale & The Surfboard.

The owl and the surfboard. I have previously mentioned the astronomical names of objects often resemble what they look like. Two prime examples are M97 the Owl Nebula & M108 the Surfboard Galaxy. The Owl is a planetary nebula, (not a planet) but the violent death of an exploding star, ejecting shells of gas & material into space, Still expanding some 8000 years later at 35km per second, can you see the owls eyes? M108 the Surfboard Galaxy lies some 2000 times more distant at 26 Million light years. Another example of a Galaxy viewed edge on from our perspective and uncannily resembling a surfboard.

M106

There are a handful of Galaxies that present themselves at such an angle you get to see the the immense spiral structure, dust lanes and nebulae in all their splendour at once. M106 is one such beauty right above us this evening. 5 minute sub exposures controlled via the ASI air pro2 reveal some amazing structure in the spiral arms and dust. Numerous other fuzzies are clearly visible within the frame and one immediately caught my eye as the first frame came in is Ngc4217. Believed to me associated to M106, Ngc4217 is viewed edge on and has a very prominent dust lane splitting it in two from our perspective.  At 60 Million light years plus away, appears to me in sub frames very much like M104 The Sombrero Galaxy, my meagre 554mm focal length does not do it justice. Ohhhhhhhh for an 11" SCT. 

The screenshot is the a 5 minute sub frame for the ASI Air Pro. A revolutionary micro computer that has dedicated software for communication, Imaging, Guiding, Auto focus, Scope control and filter wheel (not used). The latest beta release now includes planning to allow multiple targets unattended. A typical imaging session starts with rolling back the dome shutter and power up. I have connected a TP Link travel router to provide greater wifi signal for control inside the house. It takes a minute or so to run it's start up and connect to my tablet. This connects automatically to the ASI Air pro and we are away. My permanent set up means polar alignment is not required every session so I can go straight to target and plate solve. I start a plan in tonight's case M106 from there I leave the obsy and return inside the house. It starts will cooling the main imaging camera to -10 then runs the auto focus routine, guiding initiates and starts guiding using multiple stars, when the guiding has settled the autorun of imaging begins. I have auto focus set to run every hour as in the dome I don't think I need the temperature probe.

 Currently into hour 2 and I have rejected a couple of frames as there are a few gusts of wind that cause the guiding jitters. So averaging at just over .50 arc sec guiding very happy with that. Just opened Carte du Ceil to identify a very faint dot around mag 15 to the north west of the galaxy. It identifies it as PGC 39615 a mag 16.05 irregular galaxy. I really enjoy seeking out  and identifying the obscure and faint within an image.